Now that the defamation case of the century is over, what happens next for the key players?
Apart from an enormous $25 million-plus costs bill, the biggest problem with losing for Ben Roberts-Smith and his well-funded support network is that journalists like Nick McKenzie are now free to produce a steady stream of stories relying on all the information gathered during the five-year lawsuit.
And so it was over the weekend with McKenzie producing this Sunday story about the alleged intimidation of witnesses, which included Roberts-Smith reportedly emailing a legal threat to Gina Rinehart because she had a relative in the SAS who was one of his internal critics. Extraordinary!
Last night there was a lengthy piece on 60 Minutes, and on June 28, McKenzie’s book on the saga, Crossing the Line, will be published by Hachette Australia. There was also this long read in Nine’s Saturday papers detailing the workings and perspectives of the Roberts-Smith support network funded by Seven Network chairman and billionaire Kerry Stokes.
McWilliam emails
The Saturday feature included some extracts from emails sent to me by Seven West Media legal director Bruce McWilliam in early 2021 related to this April 2021 Crikey story.
McWilliam is a fantastically frenetic and wild emailer, unlike any other senior executive or director of a public company I’ve ever dealt with. A look back at past exchanges includes being called a “stupid idiot”, a “self-important fool” and a “cretin”.
McWilliam never liked any critical commentary about him, Seven West Media or Stokes, including the aforementioned Crikey piece calling on the independent directors to either force the immediate resignation of Roberts-Smith from the company or resign en masse themselves.
They never did, and Roberts-Smith’s resignation was only offered and accepted on Friday after the devastating judgment by Justice Anthony Besanko was delivered.
Investors were pleased as Seven West Media shares jumped two cents, or 5.3%, to 40 cents on Friday, giving it a market capitalisation of $600 million. However, as usual when it comes to controversial news, Seven West Media made no announcement to the ASX, leaving its 15,000 retail shareholders to rely on media reports to find out what was going on.
Given the calamity that has unfolded for Seven and Stokes, the more relevant question now is whether the 67-year-old McWilliam, who controversially attended most of the 110-day trial with Roberts-Smith, will be terminated by the board.
Perhaps the broader issue is what Kerry Stokes does next — along with what advertisers, shareholders and regulators do with Kerry Stokes.
When quizzed at the 2022 Seven West Media AGM about the Roberts-Smith matter, this is what happened according to a report in The Age the following day:
Callum Foote, who was attending the AGM on behalf of activist shareholder Stephen Mayne, said he was called over by a woman to speak to Stokes after the AGM concluded, where he had asked a series of questions about Roberts-Smith’s case and employment status.
‘Tell Stephen that Ben Roberts-Smith is innocent and deserves legal representation and that scumbag journalists should be held to account. And quote me on that,’ Stokes said, according to Foote.
However, a Seven spokesman later denied Stokes made these comments, including to a reporter from the AFR.
Stokes on the grill
For some reason, Australia’s 100-plus billionaires rarely get cross-examined in court, appear before parliamentary inquiries, or even give interviews. Sometimes, using the legal protections of a public AGM is the only way to engage with them.
If Stokes’ close friend and fellow billionaire James Packer can be forced to appear before judicial inquiries in three separate states over scandals at Crown Resorts, then surely it is time Stokes was grilled about his suitability to remain in charge of coveted federal government television licences, which reach more than 90% of the Australian population after last year’s $132 million takeover of Seven’s regional affiliate Prime Media.
It was scandalous Stokes ignored the fact that, via his powerful position as the proprietor and chairman of Seven for almost 30 years, he was a custodian of journalism and free speech in Australia. Instead, he used his huge resources to launch an extensive legal war against a rival media company, individual journalists and even former SAS soldiers preparing to testify against Roberts-Smith, a now thoroughly discredited murderer and liar.
His fitness to remain a television licensee should be probed, ideally by someone like Adam Bell SC, the Sydney barrister who did such an excellent job at the Crown Sydney and Star Entertainment inquiries commissioned by the NSW Gambling regulator.
Alternatively, Stokes could try to head off the coming backlash by apologising for backing Roberts-Smith, resigning as Seven West Media chairman, and donating $50 million of his estimated A$6.3 billion fortune to press freedom causes — out of which Nine’s legal costs could be covered and traumatised SAS soldiers who gave evidence against Roberts-Smith could claim compensation.
Stokes resigned quietly as chairman of Seven’s parent company, Seven Group Holdings, on November 17 2021, handing over to former Coca-Cola Amatil chair Terry Davis to be independent chair and his son Ryan Stokes to be CEO. Stokes owns 57% of Seven Group, which owns 39% of Seven West, effectively giving him 22.2% of the media empire on a fully diluted basis.
At age 82, what is the point of Stokes remaining chairman of Seven West Media, where he draws an annual fee of $335,000? At the very least, he could offer to match the honourable practice of Kerry and James Packer and work for free.
McWilliam, who was worth an estimated $100 million-plus in 2017, should also see his pay cut in 2022-23. Malcolm Turnbull’s friend lives in a $30 million Point Piper mansion and clearly didn’t need the $1.67 million he was paid by Seven West Media’s long-suffering shareholders last financial year. Particularly given he spent so much of the year sitting in the Roberts-Smith trial having advised Stokes and the Seven West board to back the wrong horse.
Stokes and Seven have never regarded themselves as being in the news and journalism sector.
Seven is merely an entertainment and sports channel and a (becoming legacy) asset, a government assisted money machine now challenged for audiences by the rise of streaming and for revenue by Facebook and Google.
The purchase of West Australian Newspapers was to promote Stoke’s and his ideological fellow-travellers business and political interests. You only need to look at how disgracefully Seven and WAN were used to promote and install his employee ‘Baz’ as Mayor of Perth.
It’s more revealing to understand his position on the BRS issue through the lens of his personal fetish with the military. He has been behind the turning of a once somber and respectful AWM into a military theme park and has appointed a number of ex-military types to senior positions in his organisation.
Once you understand this, his disregard of public interest journalism in this and many other instances is quite logical from his perspective.
That’s a bullseye
Why does he have this military fetish?
Never been within cooee of a shot fired in anger.
Yeah, pity they’ve never had a quiet chat with the poor traumatised bastards who have been.
80% of ptsd suicides have never seen live action in a war zone..
You have no idea what you’re talking about Jaybuoy
Actually, I apologise Jaybuoy as most PTSD suicides are from sexual assault or domestic violence traumas.
Just a hobby. Some old guys have train sets or breed pigeons. You might play golf or enter flamenco competitions. I argue with strangers on the internet. Rupert Murdoch has a pet country that he pulls the wings off & pokes with a stick for relaxation. Stokes collects expensive military memorabilia.
Given the brouhaha over the unnecessary expansion of the Australian War Memorial during the tenure of Brendan Nelson with Kerry Stokes a very prominent board member in all likelihood pushing his own pet issues, perhaps the whole AWM board also needs a thorough cleanout so that people with some perspective and actual knowledge of Australian involvement in wars get a guernsey.
We might then see a more realistic representation of the whole ANZAC farce, a little more attention given to the frontier wars between white colonialists and Indigenous people, and less glamourisation of so-called ‘heroes’, who inevitably are revealed to have feet of clay.
Nobody disputes that the armed forces usually have a rotten job to do but less glorification of war itself, and a more considered examination of Australia’s involvement in war, especially those of recent times, would be welcomed by those of us not keen to ‘wrap ourselves in khaki’ like some unscrupulous politicians who want to ride on the coattails of those who do the actual fighting, for their own political advantage.
Patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels, and haven’t we had a fistful of those blighters undermining good government for way too long?
The role of the AWM is as a memorial. I am not at all sure that it needs people with knowledge of wars to be on the AWM Board.
… less glorification of war itself, and a more considered examination of Australia’s involvement in war,.. I agree that is what is needed. The $500,000,000+ currently being spent on the AWM is enabling a glorification of war toys and, in my view, is exactly what is not needed in a national memorial. To facilitate the new “exhibitions” a design winning memory hall has been demolished.
would not mind a contract to paint the walls.
ours has been turned into a trade fair for arms sales..
The real question here is why the useless ACCC agreed to scrap the cross-media ownership laws as part of an attack on the ABC by the then government – aided by Nick Xenophon and Pauline Hanson. Those changes were warmly welcomed by Stokes and co who realised the immense power it would give them. Now we have a chaotic media landscape in Australia and it’s amazing that any real journalism still exists in small pockets such as Crikey. It’s time to overhaul the media ownership laws in this country. By their own admission Stokes and others run an elite billionaire’s business mafia in Perth, aided by The West Australian which fluffed up McGowan as long as the government did their bidding. Stokes also used his media in Perth to elect his never involved in politics employee Basil Zempilas to role of Lord Mayor of Perth and the iconic Seven West Telethon help control business locally under the guise of charity while claiming philanthropic status. The rich get richer and the poor get the picture but there is apparently bugger all we can do about it.
More broadly it’s because Australian corporate sector, with ‘owned’ political allies, prefer anti-competitive cartels and oligopolies through political patronage, while proclaiming ‘free market’ ‘free speech ‘ etc.
Jack, love your work, any chance you can paraphrase your insights for those of us who read on the go?
next thing you’ll be sayin’ that Gina has purloined the West Australian of the year title … quite apt that Mcgowans last act as premier was the annointing..
I thought he was held to account – and, as usual, nothing happened?
Funny watching Maiden on the couch of Insiders yesterday, holding forth on the pile-on of Stokes’ minions, in their pursuit of those that asked questions about Roberts-Smith : while nothing is ever said about the way Limited News pursues their ‘quarry’?
“For some reason Australia’s 100-plus billionaires rarely get cross-examined in court, appear before parliamentary inquires, or even give interviews.” I think that might include Limited News (good name). And we both know that we need to speak in abstract about Limited News, because if we don’t, the Comments Moderator bot will not let us post.
Maiden is interesting as a News Ltd journalist. She broke the story about Morrison’s Hawaii holiday when at the New Daily, after being “let go” by Sky – presumably because she was practising actual journalism. News keeps her on the website, not on their scurrilous hard copy publications. I assume this is because News.com wants some degree of credibility and Maiden wants to eat.
I thought Maiden’s revelations about her 2014 experience were a useful reminder about how the wealthy keep important information so far out of the media and our knowledge. There was nothing in what she said that suggested other media owners aren’t up to the same thing. That Speers responded the way he did was what intrigued me.
… It’s not like Rupert would do that?
Of course he would do it. I don’t think she was suggesting he wouldn’t. She was just talking about a particular experience she had trying to do her job not saying it was limited to one media outlet.
And I’ll wager there’s a few things she can’t delve – for fear of ‘retribution’.
More than likely.
And speaking of that Insiders’ couch and disclosure (or lack of it) where’s Rupert’s James Campbell and his buttocks been, since Aston?
…. Could it be that he only joined the Liberal Party for that by-election – with his wife the Liberal candidate?
… Could it be that “Insiders” only just found out he was a “Liberal Party member”? … I mean, them being part of the “journalist” fraternity, and so probably possessed of a cynical and curious nature :- they didn’t suspect he might be a member, some time earlier; his wife being a Liberal City of Melbourne councilor, and all, before, since 2020?
… Or could it be that they had known for some time, but thought we rubes didn’t need to know of his party allegiances/affiliations?
He was such a (monthly?) regular since Spivsy’d taken over….
In defence of Insiders, there isn’t any so extreme on the green/’left’ plane as a working Herald-Sun journos is to the conservative ‘right’. So the ‘balance’ agenda was met by having a member of the foreign media-baron and conservative agenda to ‘balance’ the centre. In practice Campbell was identified as a Liberal insider as the panel would turn to him to answer the question, ‘what the hell is going on with the Libs?’ To that extent his contribution was worthwhile, but more often it was useful illustration of his unsuitability to work on anything other than print, an awkward mouthpiece for the talking points of the L&NP’s.
Who knows. Maybe his time is just up and there’s a new News Corp representative doing their stint now.
I think there’s a lot of paranoid talk about Speers. In the early days Barry Cassidy had Andrew Bolt and Piers Ackerman on the panel.
Comic relief?
He also had The Saturday Paper’s Mike Seccombe on regularly – where’s he been since Speers took over?
Would Cassidy have had Benson and Viellaris (Dutton ‘press secretary’ at Rupert’s Curry or Maul) on?
It wasn’t that long ago there was a good chance you’d turn it on and that set would be filled with Limited News alumni.
Political journalists like these will work all hours. To expect them to give up their Sunday mornings too is a bit rich.
My bet is that media outlets have a roster and anyone wanting to be on the telly puts their name on a list and then some poor sod tries to create a roster than suits everyone.
For mine, Speers spends too much time viewing the political world through his own letter-box perceptions, setting Gotcha! traps and jumping to short-cut conclusions.
He won a Walkley off the back of tripping up ‘Bumbles’ Brandis : and he’s been trying to square the ledger by catching a Labor (or even a Greens will do) politician ever since, with sod all to show for that effort.
…. As Kerry Packer woulda sorta put it :- ‘You only get one George Brandis in your lifetime.’
I don’t mind Speers but I do wish he hadn’t toned down that early approach he had to interviewing when he first went to Insiders. Watching those interviews was like being on a roller coaster ride. Those politicians were beside themselves and barely able to muster the next lie and obfuscation. It was fantastic.
Well done, Stephen Mayne. Rattling the almost impenetrable cages of the wealthy!