Letter from the editor

Last month, a public statement from Meander Valley Council was shared on the council’s website and Facebook page by general manager John Jordan with Councillor Wayne Johnston’s approval, but without prior knowledge of the majority of councillors.

The post included four letters from Mr Jordan to the Gazette, but did not include my replies, which he had received, but has failed to acknowledge publicly.

Cllr Tanya King shared the statement and letters across several Facebook pages.

The Gazette has asked Mr Jordan, Cllr Johnston and Cllr King to take down these public posts. To date, they have not done so.

Mr Jordan wrote his four letters to the Gazette between July 2020 to January 2021, claiming the Gazette is ‘inaccurate’, that it breaches journalistic standards and displays ‘bias’ against the council and council staff.

Mr Jordan’s first letter was published in the August 2020 Gazette.

As managing editor, I politely replied to his other three letters, but declined to publish them. An open offer was made to reconsider this decision, if defamatory statements were removed. Mr Jordan rejected this offer.

Do not be misled. This dispute is not just about alleged inaccuracy and bias.

Council and the Gazette have been in disagreement on how the Gazette reports on council business since early 2019.

In a letter to the Gazette in May 2019, Martin Gill was forced to address the issue of the council using its advertising as leverage with the Gazette.

In a letter to the Gazette in August 2019 , Wayne Johnston reiterated that ‘council did not threaten to withdraw its monthly double page spread from the Gazette. Council’s pages in the Gazette provide a valuable community service’.

But the announcement of the Northern Regional Prison to be built at Westbury in September 2019 created additional pressure over the following months. That is, to cease reporting ‘negatively’ on the prison if we expected council advertising to continue.

The Gazette is published by Meander Valley Connect Inc., which is run by a committee.

In February 2020, a committee member unexpectedly offered to act as intermediary between the council and the Gazette. Without full committee approval and against the advice of Gazette management, he met informally with Mr Jordan and Cllr Johnston, subsequently reporting that ‘Wayne and John, personally and corporately, also expressed their belief that our coverage of the prison issue appears to them to be a little one-sided.’

Without committee approval, he then urged the newspaper to immediately remove all prison coverage and anti-prison ads and attempted to arrange a ‘review’ of the Gazette by Country Press Australia. When the committee was informed, it declined to take the member’s advice and he hastily resigned.

On 3 March, Mr Jordan wrote that ‘council’s use of the Gazette as an advertising medium will continue … based on need, timing and suitability of newsprint as the most effective information channel.’

By the end of April, amidst Covid-19, council advertising had ceased.

We are now the subject of Mr Jordan’s public statements which demonstrate naivety about how newspapers work.

He claims that one reporter writes most of the content, unsupervised. Yet as editor, I supervise all content.

Small newspapers are often owned, written and edited by one person, eg, the Northern Midlands Courier and, until sold, the King Island Courier.

Gazette staff understand the need for balanced reporting.

However, in this community, three vocal groups of prison opponents actively engage with the Gazette and other media. Many passionate prison supporters will only comment on social media.

We report government statements on the prison and the State Government has booked a full page advertisement for 12 months to provide regular updates on the project.

We also believe that qualifications, experience and salaries of council employees are matters of public record and of significant public interest, especially to ratepayers. As are actions and comments made by council staff as part of their paid employment.

Reporting on these matters does not breach ‘a person’s reasonable expectations of privacy’ as claimed by Mr Jordan.

Many newspapers maintain professional standards of integrity without belonging to the Australian Press Council.

The Gazette is a member of the Victorian Country Press Association (part of Country Press Australia). This association does not review or supervise members. We joined to gain access to more advertising, not because of council complaints.

When we get it wrong, we will publish a non-defamatory letter from the complainant. Where there is a proper need for a correction, we will correct the record ourselves.

Ignoring the Gazette’s established complaints process, Mr Jordan threatens to go directly to the Australian Press Council. He also threatens unspecified legal action. If he takes this path, any legal costs would be paid for by ratepayers.

Meander Valley Council does not own the Gazette. Nor has it any right to style itself as a protector or mediator between the community and the Gazette.

We present facts and observations of interest to the community. We allow readers to make up their own minds.

This is how journalism works in a democracy. For the broad benefit of readers, not to further the interests of those in positions of influence or authority.

The council is welcome to advertise with us or meet with us. It is not the Gazette that is unwilling to engage. The Gazette is simply striving to remain free from interference.

We have always preferred not to publicise this dispute, but Mr Jordan and Cllr Johnston have chosen to do so. We have therefore responded publicly.

Mr Jordan, Cllr Johnston and a few other councillors may be happy to shoot the messenger.

I doubt that most of our readers would feel the same.

Please let us know your views. You usually do.

Liz Douglass