I very rarely disagree with my esteemed former colleague Jonathan Holmes (Objective reporting: It's a thing of the past) on matters of journalism, but it's time to speak up for the endangered and misunderstood discipline of objective reporting.
On one matter, Jonathan is absolutely right. The notion of objective reporting is seen by many as out of fashion and out of date. Fine in theory, but in the real world it is either impossible to achieve or 'too bloody dull'.
It is often parodied as a recitation of facts devoid of context or colour, leading to 'he said/she said' stories that list the views of the usual suspects on a topic but leave the reader, listener or viewer none the wiser about who's right and who's wrong. The reporter responsible for such stories is employing the 'view from nowhere', pretending they neither know nor care about the matters they are reciting.
That is certainly a problem, and we see plenty of examples of it. But that's not objective journalism, that's just bad journalism. Anyone who simply collects facts and sets them down is not a reporter. That's not journalism, it's stenography.
It has always been the case that reporters need to sift through facts, weigh them up, make editorial judgements about their relative strength and importance, and then present them in a way that illuminates the truth of a matter. It's not called 'editorial' content for nothing.
This process of making editorial judgements about facts is fundamental to great journalism. It explains why a program like Four Corners can expose what is going on inside the greyhound racing industry or 7-11 stores without in any way compromising its commitment to objective journalism. Or why 7.30 can deliver a series of stories exposing underpayment and exploitation of postal workers. The journalism is passionate, compelling and influential. It also happens to be in the best tradition of objective journalism.
It doesn't involve abandoning a commitment to impartiality and following your own whims and preoccupations. Nor does it involve handing out undigested facts by the truckload and leaving a bewildered audience to try and make sense of it.
What it does involve is gathering information without fear or favour, weighing and assessing that information and then reaching a conclusion based on the evidence. It involves a conscious and disciplined process where the evidence is not misrepresented or suppressed if it doesn't suit a preconceived opinion. A process where the reporter examines and challenges his or her own assumptions and blind spots as well as everyone else's.
Conclusions arrived at using this process are all the stronger for it. The passion and purpose that drives good journalism comes from the facts and not from rhetoric, spin or sophistry.