Part 1.
Pt.2
Pt.3
The Australian
July 21, 2010 12:00AM
The Prime Minister needs far greater media scrutiny
WEEK one of the campaign and Julia Gillard is getting away scot-free in some sections of the press. The Labor leader is doing everything by the book. She's the perfect 
In March, editor-at-large Paul Kelly wrote about the progressive media's problems in reporting on Tony Abbott, whose "muscular, conservative Christianity" they found offensive. Rather than look at his policies, a Four Corners profile screened at that time focused on the Opposition Leader's religion, reflecting the ABC's dominant ideological mindset that Christianity is a "negative, repressive factor".
One might have thought, given her atheism, that these same journalists would have found it easier to focus on the things that really matter about Ms Gillard. One might have expected that, given she has been in the job for less than four weeks, the Prime Minister would have been under close scrutiny, her policies dissected along with her makeup. Not so. From day one when The Sun-Herald virtually endorsed Ms Gillard on its front page, they have failed to apply the basic rules of reporting to Labor's campaign.
There is no disputing that Mr Abbott has made it easy with his gaffe over industrial relations and his lacklustre start to the campaign. But the problem runs deeper, with the assumption that the conservative side of politics is fair game, while Labor needs not to be challenged too hard.This is not a new phenomenon. Throughout Kevin Rudd's ascendancy and his government, the ABC and Fairfax papers failed to nail his true character or understand what a mess he was in -- inside the party and in the electorate. They ignored the debacles over pink batts and the Building the Education Revolution. They swallowed the idiocy of alcopops, Grocery Choice and Fuel Watch. In short, they had no idea there was trouble at mill.
Now Ms Gillard is positioned as the new broom sweeping away the Rudd detritus. Except that since 2007 she was deputy prime minister and a member of the Kitchen Cabinet, as responsible as Mr Rudd for government decisions. Indeed, it was Ms Gillard who urged the backflip on the emissions trading scheme that helped undo Mr Rudd.
Yet her beliefs, political vision and policies are not being tested by many in the media.
Letting the Prime Minister off the hook does the nation a great disservice. We need to know what she -- and her government -- really stand for. We need to get behind Ms Gillard's carapace of genial certainty and start asking the tough questions about her policies and record. The past few days have shown both leaders are happy to focus on the diminishing horizon of reform. As Alan Mitchell wrote in The Financial Review this week, the Prime Minister is under pressure to mimic the example of former NSW premier Bob Carr and do "as little as possible for as long as possible". It is not good enough, but without more scrutiny, the Prime Minister might just get away with it. Mark Scott at the ABC and Brian McCarthy at Fairfax need to pick up the phone and tell their editors to muscle up and scrutinise both sides of politics.
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