A senior News Corp Australia executive has defended the company’s platforming of climate science deniers, saying its news outlets were not part of a “denial machine” spreading misinformation.
News Corp Australia’s executive chair, Michael Miller, told a Senate inquiry into climate and energy misinformation there was no coordination across the organisation’s news outlets to feature voices sceptical of climate action or Australia’s current goal to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions.
Chair of the committee, Greens senator Peter Whish-Wilson, asked Miller “why do you platform climate sceptics” and said News Corp “[relies] on lots of opinion pieces from lots of people that are climate deniers.”
“I hope you are not suggesting that we should censor them?” Miller responded.
“This country has a great democracy and healthy debate and to answer your question there are people with differing opinions to your own but that doesn’t mean they can’t have a voice.”
Miller said the company was “expressing a range of views” and “to say that we platform climate deniers, I would need more detail, but we need to be able to have a debate in this country and that is what we do.”
Whish-Wilson said several submissions to the inquiry had claimed News Corp Australia was part of a “climate denial machine” that included PR companies, thinktanks and consultancies.
Asked if News Corp was part of that machine, Miller said: “No. We are part of a debate machine maybe, but not a denial machine.”
The News Corp-owned Sky News Australia has previously been identified as a global hub for climate misinformation in analysis published by UK thinktank the Institute for Strategic Dialogue in 2022. The company has rejected that analysis.
In one submission to the inquiry, Climate Action Against Disinformation – a coalition of groups working to combat false narratives on climate and energy – said readers of some News Corp publications were more likely to accept misinformation than those who read other outlets.
A submission from not-for-profit group Climate Communications Australia detailed analysis of the 22 most-read online news outlets.
Those containing the highest degree of misinformation, the submission claimed, were News Corp Australia outlets, including The Australian and Sky News.
Asked by Labor Senator Michelle Ananda-Rajah to respond to the analysis, Miller said: “How that report defines misinformation I would challenge. An opinion someone disagrees with is not misinformation.”
Campbell Reid, News Corp Australia’s group executive on corporate affairs, policy and government relations, also defended the company’s reporting of the 2019 and 2020 black summer bushfires.
One story in The Australian, shared by Donald Trump Jr, suggested arson was a major factor in the fires. The Australian Press Council said after an inquiry the article was not misleading.
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One expert has said the story helped fuel misinformation around the world that arson – rather than climate breakdown – was the major factor behind the fires.
During the fires, one News Corp employee sent an all-staff email accusing the company of spreading misinformation about the fires.
Emily Townsend, a commercial finance manager at News Corp, wrote: “I find it unconscionable to continue working for this company, knowing I am contributing to the spread of climate change denial and lies.”
Miller rejected Townsend’s claim and said News Corp outlets had written 3335 stories about the bushfires and 12% had mentioned climate change and 5% had mentioned arson.
Asked if there was coordination across News Corp to feature the views of thinktanks like the Institute of Public Affairs – a rightwing group known for its opposition to climate action – Miller said there wasn’t, and each masthead was free to make its own editorial decisions.
Miller was also asked about James Murdoch’s 2020 resignation from the board of News Corp and his reported frustrations about the company’s climate coverage and the “ongoing denial” he said was present in its Australian outlets.
Miller said: “Climate change is real, I have been on the record for that. So has Rupert Murdoch and so has Lachlan Murdoch.
“I don’t believe that James Murdoch was reading our titles to come to that conclusion. He was possibly reading social media.
“If he had picked up the phone and asked I would have given him a more detailed answer.”
