By Crikey reporters Lucy Morieson and Sophie Vorrath

John
Brogden has gone, but why did it take so long for his appalling actions
at a function attended by plenty of journalists to be reported by those
journalists?

Brogden’s drunken behaviour took place at an
Australian Hotels Association function on 5 August (although some
reports put it at 29 July) and, according to an unnamed senior Labour
figure in today’s Daily Tele, quickly became “the worst-kept secret in town. Anyone in politics knows about it, on both sides.”

So what took Sydney’s papers, in particular the Telegraphs,
so long to publish the scoop? It’s a question that’s become a “major
embarrassment at Holt St,” says a News Ltd insider. One suggestion is
that the SundayTele
didn’t run the story when it
happened because one of the journalists present – indeed the victim of
Brogden’s bum pinch – was the paper’s news editor, Justine Ferrari. Why
this
caused a problem is not clear, said the source, but it robbed the paper
from what could have been a major story.

Meanwhile, none of the
other journalists, from both News Limited and Fairfax, who witnessed
Brogden’s behaviour – particularly his “joke” in which Brogden referred
to the former NSW Premier Bob Carr’s wife Helena as a “mail order
bride” – were willing to confirm what happened, while Brogden was flat
out denying it. But the Tele continued to pressure Brogden “rigorously,” said a Daily Telegraph reporter who is following the story, until he admitted to the comments on Saturday.

As
to why the various journalists didn’t want to go on the record about
Brogden’s disgraceful conduct, that’s a question only they can answer. Crikey called the Sunday Tele‘s Justine Ferrari to get her side of the story, but she was unable to get back to us today.