ACMA finds Nine News breached impartiality rules in report on council

Nine News Sunday’s reporting on allegations that former Ku-ring-gai Mayor, Councillor Cheryl Szatow, and the Ku-ring-gai Council had engaged in wasteful spending was ruled to employ a tone more commonly found in current affairs reporting, the media watchdog has found.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) found the report, which went to air in Sydney on July 16 2016, breached the fairness and impartiality requirements of the news provisions of the Commercial Television Industry Code of Practice.

Acting ACMA Chairman Richard Bean said in a statement: “The ACMA found that Channel Nine breached the fairness and impartiality requirements of the news provisions of the code by using non-neutral language, unfair juxtapositions of facts, comical graphics and a tone more commonly found in current affairs programming, to which different standards apply.