- interpretation of complex research findings, surveys, and polls in news stories
Reports:
- 'Federal laws blamed for Sydney's welfare ghettos', Paul Sheehan, The Sydney Morning Herald, 1 July 96
- 'Ethnic ghettos claim 'irresponsible', Illawarra Mercury, 2 July 96
- 'Urban Ghettos', Melbourne Yarra Leader, 8 July 96
Comment:
- The following journalists/editors comment on their coverage of Ernest Healy's report.
- The Sydney Morning Herald's Paul Sheehan
- AAP's Margaret McDonald
- The Illawarra Mercury's Peter Cullen
- The Melbourne Yarra Leader's Bob Osburn
- Ernest Healy, researcher and author of 'Welfare benefits and residential concentrations amongst recently arrived migrant communities' on how his report was misinterpreted by the media.
- The Federation of Ethnic Communities Councils of Australia comments on the harm done to communities through the use of loaded language and offensive terminology in the media.
Please note that none of the reports in the case studies have been the subject of complaints or queries under the Racial Hatred Act.
Author of Welfare Benefits and Residential Concentrations Amongst Recently-Arrived Migrant Communities, Ernest Healy, says his report was misinterpreted by the media:
In my experience, it seems that the media have some difficulty in reporting complex issues and we end up reading and hearing simplistic reports without the relevant context or background.
For example, a complex issue about a history of conflicting government policies and their cause and effect is reduced to a sentence. This may be due to factors such as time constraints of researching the report or sub-editing to fit the report into the space or time allocated.
The context here is: a heavy reliance of Vietnamese immigrants, who are disadvantaged in the labour market because they are largely unskilled and not proficient English speakers, on an exploitative informal labour market.
In my report, we used data to find out how recently-arrived groups are faring in the labour market, not with a view to victimising those groups but to guide policy development which might prevent those groups from becoming further disadvantaged.
The aim is not to stigmatise the people themselves but to identify the problem that stems from Federal Government policy. It should be possible to legitimately debate the issue of a reduction in immigration on non-racial terms and without stigmatising migrants. Reconsideration of immigration and resettlement policies should not incur a slur on migrants.
The media needs to use the information they have responsibly. They need to clearly distinguish news reporting from opinion.
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