The future of public broadcasting

1. There is a dreadful sameness to public broadcasting. Yes, I enjoyed 'Doc Martin', the first time around. I've enjoyed many British comedies. But I weary of British accents in show after show, especially when we need a translation for some of the more outlandish accents. Do we really need so many British programs on SBS as well as on ABC? Why? SBS is supposed to be showing us 'multilingual and multicultural radio and television services that inform, educate and entertain'. That's what its charter says. Why do we need endless British programs on SBS? Check through SBS and ABC TV and there are far too many British presenters, British cookery programs, British house-fixing… and so on. The same tedious people crop up time after time: Stephen Fry again. Neil Oliver again. Give us all a rest, please!
2. Too many public broadcasting programs here are weak imitations of British programs. As if to make the point, we get both. Two versions of 'Letters and Numbers'. 'QI' with Stephen Fry and then 'Randling'. Yawn….
3. Certain topics seem to be sacred. Anything about women has to present women breaking through barriers and smashing stereotypes. Aborigines seem to get the same treatment, even when someone like Anthony Mundine is carrying on with some of his stranger antics shortly before he has a fight scheduled. We are constantly lectured against making any generalizations about Muslims. And the pontificating over asylum seekers has become extremely tedious. What happened to the idea of presenting multiple viewpoints?
4. Lindsay Tanner's excellent book on media and politics savages the way in which issues are trivialized. The ABC is no exception. I saw the Prime Minister lose her shoe on some news service at midday in the middle of last week. And again on SBS TV. Again on ABC News. And on '7.30'. No doubt it appeared again on 'Lateline'. Enough, already! It wasn't that amusing or significant in the first place.
5. Whoever is in charge of ABC TV promotions must have been a kindergarten teacher. Don't just say it once. Say it over and over. Why on earth do they persist with that annoying chant "ABC News…ABC News…ABC News" four seconds before the news, which we are all about to watch anyway? Why tell us what will be on every Monday night, and then say, again, that 'Q and A' is on later? Some ABC promotions spoil the point of the program, as someone did giving away Michael Palin's punch-line one Thursday night. And we get the same promotions promoting the same tedious shows, urging us with a silly laugh to watch something that often isn't funny anyway. Could we appeal to people with an IQ of more than fifty, please?
6. Some of the sporting coverage needs a good clean-up. Grammatical mistakes in the sporting commentary are common. 'Less' and 'fewer' are confused, as are 'lie' and 'lay'. Is this quality TV? Did we really need a whole 'Four Corners' program to tell us that cycling was full of drug cheats? I never would have guessed! And do we have to hear about cricket half the year, with the commentator giving it the reverence that Vatican radio gives the pope? Where is the full range of sport: athletics, gymnastics, rowing, netball? And please, racing is not a sport, to judge from the recent torrent of allegations about doping and fixing. Coverage of the 'sport' in the Caulfield Cup gave us two minutes of women in silly hats. Why?
7. What people in the media do best is draw attention to themselves. Some supposed travel program on 7 or 9 is meant to be showing us Bali or Budapest or Dubrovnik. Sadly, little of this can be seen, for here is Mary Jane - if possible in a brief bikini, unless we are in the Arctic- talking excitedly about somewhere she knows little about. So many ABC and SBS programs are little better. Self-important people, 'celebrities' in their own bathrooms no doubt, jabber away, and the scenery can be seen somewhere in the blurry background. The exceptions are notable: David Attenborough and Michael Palin. And Professor Mary Beard, who explained what Rome was like. Forget the rest.
8. ABC News and '7.30' need a shakeup. One should not simply repeat the other. We are all bored with footage of Tony Abbott or Julia Gillard 'helping' someone put cans on a factory shelf. Or clean a factory floor. Often there seems little point to a story. The footage of 'Sculpture by the Sea' this year was a mess. The point of the wooden sculpture which makes a sound in the wind was lost, because there was no sound included. And too often there will be some famous choir which can't be heard since Monty Important talks right over it. The boys on 'The Hamster Wheel' made many useful points about stupid TV coverage in a recent episode. Good on them.

There are issues that Australian public broadcasting should investigate. The plight of indigenous peoples in West Papua, Brazil. Ecuador and so on. The daily lives of Tamils in Sri Lanka and minorities in Malaysia and Indonesia. Again, ownership and control of resources in Australia and other Pacific countries has been talked about, but rarely properly investigated. We need more than a quick reference to Cubby Station on a public broadcaster which is supposed to be better than the commercials.

Finally, SBS and ABC need to be more self-critical. Not constantly congratulating themselves. To hear SBS talk about 'Back Where You Came From', you would think it was the greatest news since the Bible was written. Enough, already. If it's good, it will speak for itself. ABC FM radio is just as bad. Just play the music, please, and forget the silly chatter from too many people who love to hear their own voices. "It's Not All About You!" might be a theme we want to hammer over and over.

We need a program like 'Backchat' to let ordinary people criticize the programs foisted on them. The Jones controversy has shown us that, given the chance, Australians are very capable of sustained critical thought, as Jane Caro and Malcolm Turnbull pointed out. Let's give people credit for intelligence and not treat them like six year olds, as most commercial media do. Yes, public broadcasting does a great job. It has a great future, if Romney doesn't get in. But we need always to keep the media on their toes.