Earlier this week, it was announced that Kim Williams, former News Corp and Fox chief executive, would be taking over the mantle of the ABC as chair, replacing the outgoing Ita Buttrose.
Much has been made of Williams’ News Corp past, but he has a long history in professional management that takes in a number of arts and film organisations, as well as the AFL. When he replaces Buttrose in March, he’ll become the first chair in the history of the national broadcaster to have experience actually running one before appointment.
Who is Kim Williams?
Kim Williams grew up in Sydney’s northwest, son to parents David and Joan, as a student of the clarinet and, notably, Lego (he was national Lego champion at age 11). Upon leaving school, he studied music at the University of Sydney. While at university, through the late 1960s and early 1970s, he composed several productions, and was interrupted only by the Vietnam War. Williams conscientiously objected and never served in Vietnam, with the Whitlam government abolishing national service in 1972. He would go on to marry Gough Whitlam’s youngest child Catherine Dovey in 1998, after a six-year first marriage to author Kathy Lette.
He led several arts boards, joining the inaugural Australia Council Music Board (now Music Australia, a division of Creative Australia) in 1973, and ran Musica Viva Australia in 1977, first as general manager, before rising to chair from 1998-2004. He then became CEO of the Australian Film Commission, having also been an executive at the ABC itself in the 1990s, appointed to lead the broadcaster’s brief foray into pay television, before joining Fox Studios amid rights negotiations in 1995.
By 2001 he was the chief executive, remaining in the role for a decade before joining News Limited, as it was known then. He was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in 2006 for services to the arts, film and television industries. He left News Corp in 2013, and in 2014 published Rules of Engagement, a memoir of his time in the nation’s boardrooms. He would become an AFL commissioner that same year, before returning to the arts sector as chair of the State Library of NSW in 2016.
Some of Williams’ former colleagues, including those spoken to by Media Briefs, have described him as exceedingly intelligent, with one describing him as being “too smart” for Holt St. Others have described him as having a “ferocious temper”, lacking “not just social skills but political skills”.
What happened with Rupert?
To say his time at Holt St was tumultuous would be an understatement. A republished profile from The Sydney Morning Herald in 2013 tells of the toxic relationship between Williams and News’ top brass.
Over two years, “whenever [senior editors] didn’t like something Kim had told them to do, they simply called Rupert and had it reversed”, a senior executive said. Williams further endeared himself to the Murdoch family when he, together with Nine, outbid free-to-air broadcaster Network 10 (then chaired by Rupert Murdoch’s son Lachlan, who recently succeeded his father as chair of News Corp) for the television rights to the NRL from 2013 to 2017. In the process, Williams agreed to give up a number of contractual rights News Limited held over the sport, which they remain a key stakeholder in.
Williams left the company in 2013, having been “grin fucked”, to use one News Ltd editor’s turn of phrase. Williams himself had introduced Holt St to the term in a foreboding 2011 speech — “grin fucking is when I say to do something, you sit there and nod your head and grin, then walk away and fuck me over”.
What is his vision for Aunty?
While Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described him as the “perfect fit for the role” in announcing the appointment, Williams does not come without criticism of the national broadcaster.
In 2012 he told Radio National he was uncomfortable and impatient with the “almost endless capacity for self-congratulation in which the ABC and its executives indulge”. He also accused the broadcaster of relying on other outlets to break news for it.
In a recent interview with Capital Brief, Williams said the ABC is “bland” currently, a function of being “over-managed in the wrong ways”.
Williams also told ABC Radio Mornings after the announcement this week that it was “imperative” that the ABC is “absolutely verifiably independent, offering at all times true journalistic integrity and to the extent possible in human affairs, having an aspiration to freedom from bias”.
Asked about how the national broadcaster should respond to criticism, Williams said scrutiny is “part and parcel of things that matter”.
“It is important that the ABC at all times maintains a balanced and sober response to that sort of scrutiny and defend its position in a way that is not grandiloquent but is in fact calm, measured and authoritative,” he said.
Williams joins the organisation at a tumultuous time, with the broadcaster currently locked in a Fair Work Commission battle over its alleged sacking of journalist Antoinette Lattouf. Lattouf says she was dismissed on the grounds of a political opinion and/or her race, after posting to Instagram a Human Rights Watch post that alleged Israel was using starvation as a tool of war. Lattouf did not work the final two days of her five-day casual fill-in contract at the ABC on Mornings. A mediation hearing on January 18 did not see a resolution, with ABC union staff passing a no-confidence motion in managing director David Anderson on Monday, 125 votes to three.
When asked how he would address these concerns of staff morale at the broadcaster, Williams said “editorial [leadership] needs to listen”.
“I think the best response in all matters of morale which reflect intense opinion and feeling about directions, editorial needs to listen, and to encourage discussion where there is no sense of punitive response but there is a sense of genuine managed engagement.”
This comprehensive survey of Williams compares favourably with yesterday’s Guardian profile that referred to him as a “film and arts buff”. A significant omission here imo is the time Williams spent as Chair of The Copyright Agency. Not many people know it. It’s a not for profit organisation set up under the Copyright Act to collect and distribute royalties for authors and provide licensing solutions for people who want to use copyright protected literary works and images. In that capacity Williams was a fierce advocate of the rights of creators and crossed swords a number of times with IP academics and the Productivity Commission over some of its recommendations in a 2016 enquiry into Australia’s IP system. The Melbourne Press Club described a speech he gave at a lunch they ran in 2016 thus: “In a fierce speech, Williams outlined the fundamental importance of copyright not only to the inalienable right of creators to control their work but also to secure Australian cultural production. He believes the Productivity Commission report has been overly influenced by an ideological agenda developed over many years by global digital corporations to realise the goal of free use of other people’s intellectual property”. He spoke about Apple as a positive story of a digital tech company that respects copyright and engages constructively with rights holders. He then continued:
“But when you look around today the notion of copyright is under attack from multiple fronts – by some tech companies, some woefully disconnected academics, and some economic think tanks who really should know better”.
He’s unlikely to be a shrinking violet within and outside the ABC, but we should expect that he will have a keen appreciation of the role of a Chair compared to the role of the executives and managers of the organisation.
The acknowledgement of country section of his Melbourne Press Club speech is one of the better examples I have come across: https://www.melbournepressclub.com/article/fighting-for-our-copyright
Might also provide a bit of biffo at Senate Estimates hearings, too.
…he told Radio National he was uncomfortable and impatient with the “almost endless capacity for self-congratulation in which the ABC and its executives indulge”.
…Williams said the ABC is “bland” currently, a function of being “over-managed in the wrong ways”.
Totally agree with both comments as they relate to tv. Not so sure about ABC radio as I am a constant listener of ABC Classic and have no complaints there – though that may change as it has announced a re-structure schedule that commences from Monday.
“He also accused the broadcaster of relying on other outlets to break news for it.”
Indeed – which is why we see Rowland and Millar reciting the front pages of the Murdoch and Nine media on ABC TV every morning – or at least we used to when I used to watch it before I gave up.
“He also accused the broadcaster of relying on other outlets to break news for it.”
Indeed – which is why we see Rowland and Millar reciting the front pages of the Merde-Dog and Nine media on ABC TV every morning – or at least we used to when I used to watch it before I gave up.
And it’s what gives us the Herd mentality of its cliche-riddled political journos.
And reciting them repeatedly all day like clockwork monkeys with absolutely no journalistic analysis or questioning.
More music and less yak, I hope.
I really do not mind the yak. At home alone all day, especially during covid, I enjoyed hearing human voices and though I can now get out more I still enjoy the familiar voices at the usual times. And I miss this who were regulars but have gone missing – like Martin who was due back before Christmas but will not return before mid-year.
A re-jig from tomorrow may not please. I liked the range of programs and presenters at 3pm on weekdays and they have now been moved back to 7 pm when I normally switch to tv.
I can understand that – no presenter can please all the people all the time. The current format must be popular to have lasted. I generally have the quiz on in the evenings – I’m in WA so it’s at 9pm not midnight – but only when it’s Suzanne Hill. I expect any program from the last few years could be downloaded as replacements, but what a lot of fuss that would be. I still miss Tony Delroy’s relaxed manner.
Seems Sonya Lifschitz will no longer be on ABC, loved her Saturday 8pm to midnight program. Have looked on ABC Classic FM website but no news.
Let’s see if this ‘worldly man’ can turn this pitiful national broadcaster around, maybe allow the Radio National platform to proliferate into the visual media would be a very good start, where much of its audience locate themselves. Another, would be to sack several of the current board members who are ghouls that push the same old commercial media rubbish. Why not allow an advisory committee that draws on members from the broader Australian community, rather than, the usual white upper class right-wing contagion that in recent decades has infected the Board and created a hollowed-out national broadcaster, that rarely kicks a goal when exposing the rot within Australian society, and there is a lot of rot that has not been exposed! I’d like to see first Australians, middle and lower classes Australians given opportunity to have a real say in what their ABC should represent, enabling all peoples to have real opportunity to engage and inform in principled ways that benefits us all.
Hell yeah. Seems this dude might actually follow through with some fraction of our wishes for Aunty.
I’d have to switch the telly on to find out though, and I’m well out of the habit, after the only channel I watch becoming a sad shadow of its former self, long after the only other channel I ever watched was thoroughly despoiled by the introduction of ads…
My suggestion to Mr Williams would be to begin with dialing-down the endless, mindless nationalism of ABC TV. If I hear “We are one” one more time I’ll chuck something at the telly. The Australian continent is home to numerous regions and cultures, certainly much more than the south eastern urban culture beloved by the ABC, and we are not one.
And a short rapid audit of RN’s non live delivery via Listen app/streaming in regions and offshore, plus reach and usage trends.
One suspects it has been nobbled or has throttled its digital delivery, to aid commercial players in increasing their regional reach and audience via radio/podcasts and FTA tv in Sky, while much local print has been disappeared..?
I’m with you on that. Bring me a bucket. Bloody jingoistic nonsense.
That’s right – we are many.
Guilt by association is a variant of an ad hominem attack, I’d rather judge him on how he goes in the ABC.
After reading the first paragraph of his bio here, which concluded with his marriage to Gough’s daughter, I was wondering how he ever ended up working for Merde. If we judge him on his associations, it appears that perhaps he infiltrated Limited News.
?