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The ABC's requirement of impartiality has lead to persistent debates on ABC impartiality. External critics have complained of left-wing political bias at the broadcaster, citing a prominence of Labor Party-connected journalists hosting masthead political programs or a tendency to favour "progressive" over "conservative" political views on issues such as immigration, refugees, the republic, multiculturalism, reconciliation, feminism, environmentalism, anti-Americanism, gay marriage, budgeting and the like.[1][2][3][4][5]
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Internal and external reports have drawn different conclusions on the question of bias at the ABC. A 2013 University of the Sunshine Coast study of the voting intentions of journalists found that 73.6 per cent of ABC journalists supported Labor or the The Greens - with 41% supporting the Greens (whereas only around 10% of people in the general population voted Green).[6][7] A 2004 Roy Morgan media credibility survey found that media professionals regarded ABC Radio as the most accurate news source in the country.[8]
Conservative commentators such as Andrew Bolt,[9] Tim Blair and Gerard Henderson[9] accuse the ABC of a left-wing bias. A 2009 study by academics Joshua Gans and Andrew Leigh found the ABC overall "close to the center position" but with its television news "significantly slanted" towards the Coalition[10] In rejecting criticisms of bias, ABC journalist Annabel Crabb said in 2015 that the organisation gives "voices to Australians who otherwise wouldn't be heard, on topics that are too uncommercial or too remote or too hard to be covered by anyone else, broadcasting into areas from which others have long withdrawn resources."[11] ABC journalist turned NSW Liberal MLA Pru Goward said of the organisation: " I have no doubt there was left-wing bias, I certainly thought it when I was there", while ABC journalist turned Federal Labor politician Maxine McKew said there was no left wing bias, though "what I detected years ago in the ABC, much more of a collectivist philosophy".[12]
Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke considered the ABC's coverage of the 1991 Gulf War to be biased.[13] In 1996, conservative Opposition Leader John Howard refused to have Kerry O'Brien of the ABC moderate the television debates with Labor Prime Minister Paul Keating because Howard saw O'Brien as biased against the Coalition.[14]
During the subsequent Howard Government years, ABC TV's masthead political programs were anchored by journalists with Labor affiliations: the 7.30 Report was hosted by former Whitlam staffer Kerry O'Brien; the Insiders program by former Hawke staffer Barrie Cassidy and the Lateline program by Maxine McKew who went on to defeat Liberal Prime Minister John Howard as the Labor candidate for the seat of Bennelong in 2007, at the same time as ABC Sydney News weatherman Mike Bailey ran for Labor against Liberal minister Joe Hockey.[15][16]
In the subsequent Rudd-Gillard period, Cassidy retained his position at Insiders, while O'Brien shifted to host Four Corners in 2011.[17][18] Chris Uhlmann, husband of Labor MP Gai Brodtmann, was appointed as co-host of the 7.30 current affairs program.[19] Sydney ABC News anchor Juanita Phillips began a relationship with Labor's Minister for Climate Change, Greg Combet.[20][21][22][23]