Journalists at News Corp Australia have called on management to reject the views of Daily Telegraph columnist Tim Blair who mocked and downplayed the issue of domestic violence on his blog.
Staff at the Daily Telegraph and the Australian and all the Rupert Murdoch-owned papers recently endorsed family violence leave as part of their log of claims for a workplace agreement. The papers, in particular the Herald Sun, have campaigned strongly for victims of family violence.
“The national News Corp house committee was disappointed to read Daily Telegraph opinion writer Tim Blair’s piece on family violence, published in the early hours of Monday morning,” a letter to News Corp’s head of employee relations Andrew Bioccaa said.
“Blair’s misguided attempt at humour undermined the great work News Corp has been doing to combat family violence through campaigning journalism across the group.
“We point out that family violence leave is part of News Corp staff’s log of claims in the most recent negotiating round, which was recently endorsed by members across the country.”
Endorsed by the national house committee for News Corp journalists who are members of the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, the letter calls on management to reject Blair’s comments and “recommit to campaigning against the scourge of family violence”.
A constant critic of the ABC, Blair ridiculed the ABC staff for asking for domestic violence leave but appeared ignorant that his own colleagues had logged a similar claim in the current bargaining round.
In a sarcastic piece on his blog Blair suggested ABC staff are working in a “bloodhouse” and employees beat each other up at night.
Under the headline “Tax-funded spousal assault community”, the post has outraged many journalists inside and outside the Murdoch empire.
“Evidently the ABC employs so many victims of domestic violence that they require their own special leave allowance category – which is interesting, given how many ABC employees are married to or shacked up with other ABC employees,” Blair wrote on his blog on Sunday.
“What kind of carnage-strewn bloodhouse are they operating over there? Is that why ABC staff work so few hours – because they’re always recovering from the previous night’s beatings? Why are staffers not pressing charges instead of seeking leave?”
He also hosted a video featuring a comedy sketch in which a young man repeatedly slaps everyone at a barbecue including small children.
News Corp has written to the house committee to say the company will not sanction its opinion writers.
“News is as equally committed to the fundamental principle of freedom of speech as it is to campaigning against family violence; a topic on which our extensive coverage of, and campaigning journalism about, speaks for itself,” a spokesman told Guardian Australia.
