AFP raids: the risk in taking public trust for granted

The reports were fed into the bureaucratic food-chain, but were never acted upon. Somehow, in 2005, they were leaked to The Australian and became front-page news across the nation. Kessing has always denied leaking the reports, but a lethargic Canberra bureaucracy mugged by reality demanded a scapegoat on whom to take out its scorn. Kessing was designated as the whistleblower involved.

Meanwhile, then Prime Minister John Howard urgently hired British international aviation security expert, Sir John Wheeler on a stiff fee to look in to the claims. Wheeler confirmed the dangers and vulnerabilities outlined in the reports. As Chris Mitchell summed it up in The Australian at the beginning of this week, "the responsible aviation minister was then deputy prime minister John Anderson, who took up the recommendations of Kessing's reports and spent $220 million to bolster Customs' defences against drug and terror plots. Anderson's swift and correct action showed the paper was right to reveal reports that had been sat on by bureaucrats."

Despite his denials, Kessing was charged and convicted. He was given a nine-month suspended sentence and put on a good behaviour bond for two years. He appealed, and after a long, drawn-out process, lost. Now, late in his life, Kessing has lost his savings and superannuation. Only The Australian and the journalists' Media Alliance have stood by him, covering a fair swag of his legal fees. Not long after, the Blue Mountains bush fires destroyed a new home that Kessing and his wife had built with their own hands.

When Ita Buttrose, the new ABC chair and a woman with vast media experience, claims the AFP raids "had been designed to intimidate and deter public interest journalism", Houston has a problem. If we want to keep the tip-offs flowing, Canberra's going to have to get its act together. At least the media knows what its responsibilities are.