Fairness, balance, and accuracy: apparently, they're optional
The New Zealand Broadcasting Standards Authority's ruling against WBD/Stuff/ThreeNews is an-almost textbook example of why trust in the media is so low.
Having been the subject of some extremely dubious reporting in the past by the New Zealand media (including Stuff Ltd.), I was interested to read the entire ruling handed down recently by the Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA), concerning a report broadcast on ThreeNews last year.
For the uninitiated, the New Zealand television channel Three (stylised as +HR=E and owned by Warner Bros. Discovery New Zealand, or WBD) no longer has its own newsroom. It closed it down last year to save money. So now, it pays Stuff Ltd. (which operates the country’s most popular news website stuff.co.nz) to produce a nightly ThreeNews bulletin, which is broadcast live on Three at 6pm every night.
Still with me?
This will become important later, because it shows how the fracturing of the news market can cloud who is ultimately responsible when things go wrong.
Really, this BSA ruling was quite extraordinary. And I’ve read the whole thing - not just what was reported about it.
The BSA didn’t just rule in favour of the complainant. It excoriated ThreeNews for not only breaching standards but falling “well short of journalistic expectations”.
And when you dig into the details, you can see why.
Get comfortable, there’s a lot to come.
THE REPORT
On 26 July 2024, ThreeNews broadcast a news report billed as a ‘special investigation’ into the group Action for Smokefree 2025, or ASH.
It opened with the presenter in-studio saying:
“To a special investigation now, and concerns are being raised over links between anti-smoking organisation ASH and the pro-vaping lobby.
ASH Director Ben Youdan visited Australia in February as the country looked to ban disposable vapes.
ThreeNews can reveal his trip was coordinated by the founder of a group which has taken money from vape businesses and whose founding chair has advocated for vaping areas in schools.”
So the angle is that a group which says it is anti-smoking is being backed by another group which has links to vaping.
The inference (as I see it) is that ASH’s motivations to stop people smoking are not entirely altruistic, because they’re being directed by lobbyists who want to get people hooked on their own addictive alternative.
Political reporter Bridie Witton went on to report:
“Parents Against Vaping and public health academics are raising concerns about ASH’s links to the pro-vaping lobby in Australia.”
“ASH runs the Year 10 Survey into smoking and vaping attitudes and behaviours with funding from the Ministry of Health. Its next survey is due at the end of the year, but its views towards vaping are outliers in New Zealand, which has invited backlash.”
“[Youdan’s trip to Australia] was coordinated by Dr Alex Wodak… [Wodak’s] organisation, the Australian Tobacco Harm Reduction Association, or ATHRA, was paid nearly $20,000 from e-liquid and e-cigarette companies in 2018. [A] spokesperson for Vape Free Kids is concerned about ASH’s relationship with ATHRA.”
THE COMPLAINT
ASH was not happy with this story, feeling it was essentially a set-up which made their group look bad.
So it lodged a complaint.
Now, this is one of the peculiar things about making a complaint over broadcasting standards. In the first instance, you HAVE to complain directly to the broadcaster. This is for news as well as general programming concerns. Then, if you don’t like the response you get, you can escalate it to the Broadcasting Standards Authority.
But frankly, how many broadcasters are going to look at their own work and say “yeah this was absolutely shoddy and we apologise for it”?
No, they defend such accusations as well as their staff and reputation.
So it’s no surprise that Warner Bros. Discovery did not uphold ASH’s complaint. It said ASH was provided with:
“sufficient information about the nature of the planned broadcast and ample opportunity to comment”.
WBD also said many of the allegations made in the broadcast were put to Youdan for comment; and that the broadcast otherwise included a range of perspectives on vaping to provide balance.
Unsatisfied with that, Youdan and ASH took the next step and made a complaint to the Broadcasting Standards Authority.
The claim was that WBD and the report which it broadcast:
misrepresented ASH’s position on the issues;
was unbalanced, as ASH was not given a right of reply;
didn’t fully inform ASH of the nature of the story, nor gave it a fair opportunity to comment.
Accuracy, balance, and fairness - all under threat.
And boy, were ASH’s concerns warranted.
THE OBFUSCATION
Communications between journalist Bridie Witton and Ben Youdan show how Youdan repeatedly asked what the story was about.
It was initially presented as “researching a political story” on the vaping landscape.
And in the transcript of a 30 MINUTE interview which Witton conducted and recorded over Google Meet (a long interview for a story which would have been a maximum of two minutes on-air), I can count SIX instances of Youdan asking her where the story had come from, what it was about, and where certain allegations had originated.
He was given generic and what look like disingenuous answers:
“… the sort of main thrust is trying to understand sort of what the vaping picture is in New Zealand and what positions and views people are holding.”
“I think when ASH is playing such an important role and as you know, helping to shape government policy, all of those questions are intertwined.”
“Well the allegations that – well they're not. I've just given you an opportunity to respond to these links that are in the public sphere already.”
“There's no specific, you know. No. No one’s accusing you of anything.”
Remember, this was a ‘special investigation’, and yet Witton was trying to frame the whole thing as background research.
THE WITHHOLDING AND MISLEADING
Now there ARE emails from before the interview which show Witton definitely DID mention the contentious Australia trip to Youdan.
But it was never presented to him as the crux of the whole story - which is exactly what it was!
In fact, here’s her “question” on the links to the Australian Tobacco Harm Reduction Association (ATHRA):
“[Can you] see, though, the sort of tension there when Alex Wodak has, his company, you know, ATHRA organisation, you know, it did come out that it was started with this initial funding from vape businesses… but do you see why there are sort of concerns about, you know, potential links or links with yourself and someone like that when he has this history?”
Honestly, it takes a few reads of that question to find where it’s actually going!
Perhaps a more direct way of asking it for this ‘special investigation’ would have been: Have you taken money or been directly supported by ATHRA and/or Alex Wodak? Do you see a conflict of interest there? We have spoken to people who are concerned about the link between your two groups.
Or something like that.
But what’s utterly, utterly extraordinary is that none of Youdan’s answers, comments, or denials about links between ASH and ATHRA were included in Witton’s story.
NONE of them.
And there were plenty:
“I was very, very clear that I wouldn’t do anything that was funded by tobacco or vaping, including, you know, that I wasn’t going to go forward with whatever… I was absolutely clear, and I tried every assurance there was no conflict with any of that, that funding or who was hosting me.”
“I seek the assurance that I’m not being funded by vape companies and I won’t take money off vape companies and I would never have, or tobacco companies as well.”
“Look, I can understand how people would want to make that look like I’m being funded by vaping companies, which is absolutely not true.”
So, you’ll understand I feel like I’m on the end of some… tenuous ways of trying to link me with some insidious force – [which I] do everything I can to categorically not do.”
The answers were there.
The denials to the very specific angle of the story were there.
And yet the reporter left them out. ALL of them.
This is what I mean when I talk about ‘agenda-driven journalism’. There seems to be little regard for the facts. It’s the narrative which comes first. A story, or an angle, or an idea is presented to the public AS fact, instead of just PRESENTING the facts and letting people make up their own minds.
Stuff did something similar to me in 2022 - leaving out facts which I provided, and publishing a PDF of a statement I’d written, but with key paragraphs removed. I also know that it was in possession of crucial information about the events which led to my resignation from TVNZ, but never published it. The only reason I can come up with is that it didn’t suit the narrative that was being perpetuated.
It’s not even journalism - it’s a ruse. And it needs to be called out.
In its ruling on accuracy, the BSA said it found the report “overall was misleading, and the broadcaster did not make reasonable efforts to ensure it did not mislead”.
I honestly think it could have gone one step further and said that the report was INTENTIONALLY misleading.
After all, what else can it be when a journalist leaves out crucial information which it had been provided with, and which fundamentally alters the story it is telling?
“However, ASH’s viewpoint and direct responses to the issues provided important factual context – these responses were available but were left out of the broadcast.”
BSA DECISION, 26 March 2025
THE ‘BROADCAST’
Youdan also says he wasn’t aware the interview was for broadcast on television. He was under the impression that it was a ‘long form’ piece for the Stuff website.
He says he didn’t conduct himself as formally as he might have, had he known he was being interviewed for television.
Now Stuff Ltd. had only recently taken over production of ThreeNews, and WBD says Witton DID inform Youdan that Stuff now operated across multiple platforms including ThreeNews.
In its ruling, the BSA said it couldn’t determine exactly what Youdan was told, but it noted that:
“… we do not think all participants would know or expect that Stuff content may be broadcast on ThreeNews. We encourage the broadcaster to remain alert to this when ensuring people are fairly informed.”
Broadcast news has changed a lot. It used to be that the only way to be on TV was for a camera crew and reporter to come directly to you, and record an interview on videotape.
Now we have Zoom, Teams, Skype, and Google Meet - all of which are considered ‘broadcast acceptable’.
And given Witton had seemingly been solely a print journalist for Stuff (her LinkedIn profile shows no TV exposure or experience) I think she probably needed to be very clear that this was an interview for a specific TV news item.
THE SECOND STORY
But wait, there’s more!
Because four days after the original story, ThreeNews was at it again.
This time is was a short ‘live-cross’ report - again from Bridie Witton - saying that a high school in Wellington was refusing to allow its students to take part in ASH’s annual survey about smoking and vaping habits.
Live on-air, Witton said:
“… ThreeNews has obtained this email from [the school] saying it does not want to participate in the survey until ASH acknowledges the harm that vaping is causing for young people. Says this harm is significant and totally separate to the harm that smoking causes. It says, quote, ‘principals have spoken out on this issue in the media, but I have not heard you, ASH, do the same.’”
So we have a school taking a stand, and the email to prove it. Witton even says “this email” so I assume it was being brandished in front of the camera as reporters love to do.
But there was a crucial piece of information missing.
The email was from 2021.
THREE YEARS earlier.
And what’s worse is that when ASH complained to WBD (again) the decision was not upheld on the ground of:
it was the reporter’s first live cross into a television broadcast;
she had written the date into her script, but in the pressure of a live TV environment she forgot to mention it;
“even without the 2021 date included in the live cross, the audience was
not materially misled nor lacking in context.”
Now I remember my first live-cross, aged 20. It actually wasn’t bad considering my relative inexperience, but I was definitely crapping myself. So yes, a reporter’s first live-cross doesn’t always go well.
But this was a complete omission of information, and actually part of a wider pattern of misinforming the viewers.
Thank goodness the BSA saw differently to WBD, because I think anyone can see that not including WHEN something actually happened creates a misleading narrative - especially when you’ve done a one-sided report on the same group four days earlier!
The BSA was also very clear about the way in which ThreeNews presented the story, and it’s a good reminder for any news outlet about style and approach:
“The item materially misled audiences that the school’s refusal to take part in the vaping survey was a recent, ‘breaking news’ type event due to the framing and presentation of the broadcast – when in fact the email on which the item was based was sent to ASH in 2021.
This impression was supported by the live cross format and the use of Parliament as a background, which implied the issue was serious and current; live crosses are often used to discuss breaking or current news, or a new development in an ongoing story.
The language used in the broadcast also supported an impression it was a new or current development, for example, ‘ThreeNews can reveal a Wellington high school has refused to allow its students to take part in a Ministry of Health-funded vaping survey.’”
BSA DECISION, 26 March 2025
THE SEMANTICS
So ThreeNews talked about a school “refusing” to take part in the survey.
But ASH had told Witton, in an email the day before the report was aired, that the survey is actually an ‘opt in’ one. There’s no compulsion on anyone to participate. ASH invites 600 eligible schools every year, and around half of them choose to take part.
But it just doesn’t sound as controversial, does it. “Refusing” to take part is a MUCH better headline - and also a much more misleading one.
Witton concluded her live report by saying:
“But of course, the organisation’s [ASH’s] stance on youth vaping is that young people, most young people who vape are not addicted, they are simply experimenting.”
Oh, of course!
It makes it sound like ASH isn’t really concerned about youth vaping (a follow-on from the first report which tried to show ASH was being supported by pro-vaping lobbies).
It ignored what ASH had said in that same email the day before, which stated:
Action for Smokefree 2025 (ASH) shares concerns about increasing youth vaping in Aotearoa. We do not want young people, most of whom have never smoked, to vape.
The preferred approach is to prevent young people from starting to vape in the first place, and at the same time supporting young people who vape to stop.
“[The report] materially misrepresented ASH’s position on youth vaping as outlined in the statement provided to the reporter. Excluding a fair presentation of ASH’s response to the issues and including one sentence that made ASH look ‘worse’, would have significantly altered viewers’ understanding of the story.”
BSA DECISION, 26 March 2025
So once again, ThreeNews was picking and choosing what it put into its reports.
Frankly, it starts to look like IT is the one with the agenda against ASH.
THE “APOLOGY”
Part of the BSA’s ruling was that ThreeNews make an on-air apology.
Newsreader Laura Tupou read this out on-air on 22 April 2025, in relation to the first report:
“The BSA concluded the broadcast created a misleading, unbalanced and unfairly negative impression of ASH by favouring critical perspectives and failing to adequately present ASH’s position.”
And on the second report:
“The BSA found this misleading and unfair as it presented outdated information as breaking news without telling viewers the information was from 2021… the BSA concluded that ThreeNews failed to ensure accuracy by not providing important factual context… the comment from ASH included in the report did not adequately respond to the issues raised.”
So basically, it was reporting on what the BSA had found.
The apology itself was fairly muted:
“ThreeNews regrets the errors that were made in these circumstances… the authority ordered the broadcast of this statement to publicly acknowledge the breach of broadcasting standards to our audience and to remedy the potential damage done to ASH’s and its director’s reputation.”
This is no surprise.
No broadcaster wants to make an on-air retraction (Tupou herself had nothing to do with the report, but by virtue of the presenting roster became the face who apologised for it).
Actually, to say ‘apologised’ is a bit of stretch. What ThreeNews said was the bare minimum - it only spoke of “regrets” and made it clear that it was the BSA forcing them to make this “statement”.
WHO’S RESPONSIBLE?
And so we return to a point I made at the very start of this piece.
Where does the fault and responsibility lie?
Warner Bros. Discovery New Zealand is the company which the complaint was made against, but it’s broadcasting a product which is being made FOR it. It’s unclear if WBD has any say or control over the content of the nightly news bulletin, but as the broadcaster it presumably has some sort of legal provisions in place (e.g. indemnification) for such complaints and any issues of liability.
Now ThreeNews itself is the news outlet, but really it’s just a brand. ThreeNews is - for all intents and purposes - a re-badged version of the old TV3 news bulletins, with the same structure and style, made and presented by a lot of the same people, but under a different banner and management.
So I think the responsibility HAS to fall on Stuff Ltd, the reporter, and the editorial staff who allowed both stories to go on-air.
In this case, WBD deferred to Stuff when asked for comment:
“Stuff regrets the errors that were made in this circumstance and accepts the authority’s findings.
“We are committed to upholding the highest journalistic standards across all of our channels and products. We have now produced almost 300 ThreeNews bulletins for Warner Bros Discovery, with this BSA decision the only finding against our reporting.”
KEITH LYNCH, STUFF EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Like the one aired on ThreeNews, I just don’t know what to make of this statement.
Lynch IS right in that this is the sole finding against ThreeNews from the BSA. And long may it stay that way.
But it’s a massive one. There’s no wiggle-room. ThreeNews unequivocally screwed up, and so maybe this wasn’t the time to be highlighting an otherwise-unblemished record.
WILL ANYTHING CHANGE?
My hope is that lessons are learnt from this sort of thing, but experience teaches me that that kind of hope is likely misplaced.
We used to joke, when I started out in journalism in the late 1990s, that you should ‘never let the facts get in the way of a good story’. Or that a beat-up like this was just ‘maximising the story’s potential’. All good fun; just having a laugh.
But it’s not a joke.
All the details I’ve put in this article - taken from emails, broadcasts, and an investigation by the Broadcasting Standards Authority - show how journalists are apparently willing to ignore the facts and context (the ones which don’t suit a particular narrative) so they can produce the story they want - and more importantly, a story which gets the most eyeballs and clicks.
Because that’s what matters these days.
Why is trust in the media so low? Because of this sort of reporting and journalistic attitude.
I don’t advocate abuse of the media - be it from an anonymous online troll or the President of the United States.
But if you’ve read this far, you’ll see pretty clearly where that lack of trust has come from.
Now this is an encouraging ray of light in an otherwise murky landscape.