Is the media just lazy.

The mainstream media makes me laugh. I may not be qualified enough to make critical comments about the quality of our journalists. I am sure that if any professional journo happened to read this post, then they could tear me apart about my style of writing or my knowledge of the job they actually do.

However I do feel that I can speak as an everyday Australian that reads, listens or watches the work that they do. And I have to say that although not all but at least a very large proportion of what they do is lazy and ill informed.

I will honestly say that there are a small minority that do the work to report an unbiased, cross referenced and informed report of the issues. But for the most part the news that is presented by the mass media is opinion rather than impartial, is marketing rather than news or is simply cut and pasted from a media release that requires very little if any research.

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To explain myself a little the past few days have left me more than a little frustrated with the sausage machine style reporting on the new parliament arrangements. The media has been reporting to the Australian people that with the Coalition stepping away from the deal done with the independents regarding pairing of the speaker that this could leave the Government with only a one seat majority rather than two.

This leads me to believe that they do not understand or just don’t care to make the effort to report the facts.

The Government does not have any majority. The Greens and independents have only agreed to support the Labor Party on votes of No Confidence and Supply which has allowed them to form government. For all other Legislation or even a simple Division on the floor, they can’t guarantee anything.

Sure not pairing the speaker or losing any vote for whatever reason is a big deal but please report it for what it is not just what is easy. There are so many other ways the government may miss out on a vote and they are equally important to report. The opposition is going to be very touch on what they will accept as legitimate reasons to be absent from a vote. I had noticed that last year a member missed a division because he was in the toilet, at the time not so important but may be disastrous in this parliament. Good luck to the whips your work has just got much harder.

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If anybody had been out of touch during the two weeks after the election but was now catching the media coverage would think that the Labor party had simply won the election with a small majority.

How is this kind of reporting helping the Australian people to understand how their government will operate? The independents and many Australians are sick to death of the two party merry go round yet the media don’t seem to be able to break away from thinking that there is only the Red or Blue options. As I said earlier “don’t understand or just don’t care” about the reality that faces this parliament.

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So I say to all journalists (not just the political ones) remember what your job is. Report the facts as they are and don’t worry about if it matches some tired old model of fitting into a box of required ingredients. And please try and take the time to actually understand the content of your work. That’s when the Australian people will start to accept your work with some credibility again.

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