MediaFebruary 21, 2018

‘We’ll be kinder? I absolutely reject that’: The Spinoff grills NZ’s top political editors

Editor

The appointment of Jessica Mutch and Tova O’Brien to TV’s top parliamentary positions means the leading editors in the press gallery are all women. Madeleine Chapman asks four of them whether that matters, and about the broader state of play in 2018.

With the announcement that Tova O’Brien and Jessica Mutch will assume the role of political editor at Newshub and TVNZ respectively, the top five media outfits – Newshub, TVNZ, NZ Herald, Stuff and RNZ – in the parliamentary press gallery are now being led by women. Unprecedented, yes, but, say four of them, that’s where the noteworthiness ends.

How would you respond to criticisms that the media have been swept up in Jacindamania and aren’t being as critical of the new government as they should be?

Tracy Watkins, Stuff: I think it’s just nonsense, really. A number of us have been around here for a number of changes in government and each change is the same. We’ll hold politicians to account when those moments arise. I just think it’s the usual thing that people will say when there’s a change in government and it’s a government they’re ideologically opposed to. If I write a comment piece I’ll have as many people accusing me of being a leftie as in John Key’s camp or Bill English’s camp or National’s camp. And a lot of the time it’s based on their particular ideology rather than what I’ve actually written. I think people read into what you write from their own perspective. Yes, we’ll call governments and politicians to account but not always in a way that will be applauded by the other side.

Do I think we are less critical? No, I don’t. I actually really strongly disagree with people who say that back in the day the press gallery used to be tougher or dig up more stories. I think if you dig up the amount of news and coverage, including critical coverage that’s coming out of the press gallery on a daily, and even hourly, basis, I think it’s an extraordinary level of journalism and it’s good journalism. There was a Karl du Fresne column recently that was critical of the media today and if I think back to when I first started in the gallery and even before that, there was a much cosier relationship between journalists and politicians which doesn’t exist now.

Jane Patterson, RNZ: I can only speak for Radio New Zealand but we were very conscious, particularly in the election campaign, that that could be a risk. Even going so far as referring to the prime minister or the Labour leader at the time as Jacinda on air, rather than Ms Ardern or the Labour leader or the prime minister. So the language, even, was very important.

I’ve certainly been very conscious that Ms Ardern and the cabinet should be absolutely held to the same standard as the National party and that cabinet. In fact, with all of the different changes that are coming down the line under this government, we are scrutinising everything that they do. While politicians certainly have different personal styles – Ms Ardern is, I suppose, charismatic but then John Key was as well – I would argue that the same level of scrutiny has been and will continue to be applied to all political leaders and prime ministers.

Jessica Mutch, TVNZ: I think in the press gallery it’s always your job to hold politicians to account and I don’t really see how that’s changed. Everyone adjusts when a new prime minister comes in. We saw it happen with Helen Clark, we saw it happen with John Key, and we saw it happen with Bill English to a certain extent. The role of the gallery is always to hold to account and I think we’re doing that.

Tova O’Brien, Newshub: The media has been doing the same thing the media always does in the press gallery. It’s a team of some of the best journalists in the country who continue to hold the government to account and I’d call BS on [that]. I think people respond to policy in different ways but I don’t think the media has been doing their job in any lesser way than they have in the past under any other government.

Budget constraints and cross-platform demands are the new normal in journalism. How has political reporting changed since you began in the press gallery?

Tracy Watkins: I think there’s been massive change. There is much more immediacy in news during the election campaign. A lot of the time during big news events we run a live blog which basically feeds the public appetite for much faster news and to get the news as it happens. In a way it feeds on itself because people are getting used to seeing that, and having instant access to news as it happens.

Where things are different now is everything happens very quickly and we’re able to layer that with a whole lot of analysis and commentary and great video and visuals that make a whole package. You can get that all out there to an audience that almost has an insatiable appetite for politics. I think it’s actually great because there’s a huge appetite for political news. If there’s a big political story these days it always rates extremely well on Stuff. Our live blogs always rate extremely well when there are big events happening so I actually think it’s brilliant, that instant ability to access political news as it happens has really driven a lot of that demand.

Jane Patterson: We do have to prioritise and we can’t do all of the stories that we used to. We have to be very sharply focussed with our resources. In saying that – especially for RNZ – I consider it still crucial that we cover parliament, that we cover select committees, that we cover the proceedings of parliament as such because that’s where the stories are. MPs passing laws has the most impact on people and if we’re not covering what they’re doing then that’s their accountability gone.

In terms of the multimedia, resources are probably spread more thin, more than they were, just because of the extra workload in delivering that resource. But we also want to focus on original journalism and breaking stories away from the more procedural, the legislation and the select committee. So that’s a big focus for us as an organisation.

Jessica Mutch: I reckon the press gallery is the purest form of journalism in lots of ways. It’s the talking to people, it’s the relationships, it’s the history, it’s about having covered an issue for a long time, it’s about being able to see these politicians when they first come in and to grow and things like that. I think that there are always changing and evolving pressures in journalism, like lots of other industries, but in the press gallery we’re almost seeing more resources thrown in as media companies are seeing what a vital part of the organisation it is.

With TVNZ, we’ve now got more staff online because it’s multimedia and faster paced. If you ask the other guys I think they’ll probably say the same thing, that they actually have more resources there now because that’s what’s expected. For politics, there’s more resources being pumped in because there’s so many stories there, especially over the election as well. There’s such a huge focus and all the attention is on politics.

Tova O’Brien: Our team has grown significantly in the press gallery since I was last in there. When I was in there it was just me, Paddy [Gower], and Brook Sabin. Now we’ve got a team of six in the press gallery, all working across platforms so some more focused on one platform than another. There are more of us and it also pushes us to look into the stories that we’re working on in different ways. If you’re working on an online or digital piece alongside a television piece and also doing radio, you’re able to dissect and delve into it in different ways. I don’t think there’s any harm done there as long as you’re still able to focus on the the stories and things you need to do for the day.

You may have read it already but Mark Jennings has written suggesting that with the five leading political editors being women, coverage might become “less aggressive” or “kinder”.

Tracy Watkins: (laughs) I have! It’s caused a bit of controversy. I have to say I’ve been political editor since 2005 and Audrey Young at the Herald probably predates me by a little bit. At the time I came into the press gallery, Linda Clark was political editor at TVNZ, Jane Young around that time was political editor at TV3, Jane Patterson has been a political editor for a number of years. Has anything changed? No. Not as far as I know. And, no, it isn’t a move towards softer press gallery. It’s just a case of it’s the best people who put their hand up for the job actually happen to get it. That’s really all you can say about that.

I think Mark Jennings’s interest is marked by the fact that the two TV channels have both appointed women. But at the same time, as I say, this is not the first time, so it shouldn’t be a big surprise and it shouldn’t signal anything other than that there’s changes in the press gallery, which happen, often after election years.

It’s probably coincidental that at this point there’s all females in the press room but there’s gonna be times when there are, there’s gonna be times when they’re not. It’s just the way it is.

Jane Patterson: I absolutely reject that premise. In fact, we’ve had political editors, including Tracy Watkins and Audrey Young, in those positions for a number of years so I can’t see why they would suddenly change their approach – nor would I – because of changes in other offices. I would take issue with any suggestion that a female political editor rather than a male political editor would apply any less scrutiny.

I think any politician dealing with women political editors in the gallery would not come away thinking that they had been treated more kindly or softly or held to a lower degree of account than had they been dealing with a male political editor.

Jessica Mutch: Maybe if they spent some time in the media scrums they might not feel that way. I know I definitely didn’t feel that way when I was doing Q & A. You always want to challenge the person you’re speaking with, that’s what you’re there for. My job is always to challenge the person you’re interviewing and get the best information to the public and I think if you asked some of the politicians, I don’t feel like they’d think they’re getting a soft run.

Tova O’Brien: Patrick Gower and Duncan Garner were both my bosses and my mentors and I’m incredibly proud to be following in their footsteps. I’m also incredibly proud to be following in the footsteps of people like Linda Clark and Jane Young and other women political reporters and political editors who have been hugely supportive of me. I’m very proud to be a part of the women political reporting legacy that the press gallery has.

All newsrooms, houses of parliament, governments should reflect the country and the people they work for and should reflect the women they work for as well. Here in the UK we’re marking 100 years since some women gained the right to vote. With the Time’s Up campaigns and the #MeToo movement, we’re seeing that there is a shift that needs to happen. Unfortunately it needs to happen. It shouldn’t still need to happen. I think that attributing sweeping generalisations or universal attributes to all women is inaccurate and wrong. I don’t think that a woman politician is going to take a softer or a kinder approach to politics than a male politician. I don’t think a woman political editor is going to take a softer or kinder approach to politics than a male political editor would do. I think it completely depends on the character and the person and I don’t think we assign attributes like that universally to a gender.

I think there’ll be changes in so far as we’re all different people and taking up different roles. It’s wonderful that there are women in those roles and reflecting the people we are reporting for. I don’t think that’s going to make any difference based on our gender. I have a huge amount for respect for Mark Jennings too and I’m not slamming what he said but I don’t think it’s helpful or accurate to say that all us women are the same, certainly not that we’re going to soften things up or do anything in one way or another.

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MediaFebruary 20, 2018

‘It’s grim. But this is a grim drug’: The synthetic drugs ravaging our most marginalised

Don Rowe

Contributing writer

A new documentary released by VICE today reveals an underreported public health crisis. Don Rowe talks to assistant producer James Borrowdale about Syn City, an in-depth look at New Zealand’s synthetic cannabinoid epidemic.

In a shitty flat somewhere in West Auckland, 20-year-old Tammara is getting high. Between her legs is a resin-stained bottle of L&P, a socket cone-piece melted into the cap, packed full of synthetic weed. Her knuckles are tattooed – a diamond, a yin yang, a dollar sign – and in her left hand is a half-smoked roll-your-own.

“I used to mock the other cunts down the road at Henderson,” she says. “Like, oh my God, just smoke the real shit bro you’re gonna fuck up your brain. But this shit was actually way cheaper than weed, and it had much more of an effect.”

“I’ve been smoking it for six years.”

At least 25 New Zealanders are believed to have died last year as a result of smoking synthetics, or synnyz – more than in the previous ten years combined. Syn City, a new documentary by VICE, is about the people left behind.

Ex-user Trey lives with his mum. In his lounge is a shrine of sorts: a bracelet, a porcelain dolphin, a portrait in a home-made frame. His best friend Devontey Pearce died at 17 after smoking synthetics. “He was real good fulla. He was bubbly and humble and he loved doing good.”

Trey nearly died too, found asphyxiating in a bathtub before being rushed to hospital by his mum. “All she said was that I was lucky to be alive.”

Once available in almost every dairy in the country, existing in a grey area as a result of our archaic drug laws, “legal highs” were outlawed when a loophole in the psychoactive substances act was closed in 2014. But the problem, and the consequences, were swept under the rug, not solved.

Highly addicted users were driven underground, and what tiny quality control existed was totally destroyed: the market now is flooded with increasingly potent and complex compounds, cooked in laboratories in China and Hong Kong, and atomised over plant material here in New Zealand, before being sold to our most marginalised.

Doctors are clueless, parents are scared, and, as New Zealand Drug Foundation director Ross Bell told me in July, the problem with these drugs is that they get people really fucked up. Just this morning Stuff reported that two children were found last year in a house full of vomit-covered ‘zombies’ in various states of psychosis.

I spoke to VICE journalist and Syn City associate producer James Borrowdale to get his take on a terrifying – and underreported – public health crisis.

What drew you to this subject, and why now?

In June and July last year when the police announced people were dying from synthetics, that reignited interest in the story. So the project grew quite organically out of the original reporting we’d done. Someone suggested on one of our Facebook posts that we should do a documentary on this and we all looked around and thought ‘of course we should’.

It’s a story that really translates well to a visual medium too, right? Even the scenes in Tammara’s lounge, it says a lot about these substances. How did you find your subjects?

A lot of it came from the relationships that were formed during that initial reporting, before we’d even conceived as this as a video. Those relationships came about by way of us talking to people about their problems with this drug, and it ended up being critical to having access to these other people. Word of mouth got around, people put in a good word for us, and that’s sort of how it came about, just through those original relationships we formed.

Trey is currently managing his addiction successfully, even though he lost his friend and almost died himself. What to you was the difference? Is it a matter of needing a near-death experience in order to really kick these substances?

I couldn’t say. In terms of their stories, I think…in Trey’s case, I think yeah, he did need that. He talked a lot about how addicted he was and how hard this stuff is to quit, and that was something horrific that did shake him out of his malaise and allow him to get the impetus to quit. In Tammara’s case, I think from what I know she was using much more heavily than Trey, and in her case she was incarcerated for a while under the mental health act. That gave her some time away from the drugs, forcibly, but as you say she’s obviously still struggling somewhat.

What sort of considerations did you make in presenting her story? She’s obviously mistrustful of the establishment as whole, so what did you have to consider when deciding what to show and what not to show of her life?

We built these relationships and for a long time before we even thought about bringing a camera into these situations we really tried to make sure these were trustful and straight-up relationships. And these relationships all continue to this day. We didn’t want to feel like we were taking advantage of these people, and so to get to that point, it was about having built these relationships and including Trey and Tammara in the creative process as well – letting them dictate what they were comfortable with. We were always listening to them. And we always maintained that trust.

Something I found particularly fascinating, and which is underreported for the most part, is the mood in the medical establishment. Everyone knows that a substance like heroin is dangerous, but if a doctor is presented with a heroin overdose, they’ve got a pretty good idea of what to do. These doctors are working backwards, starting with the symptoms, and figuring out the mechanism of the drug in reverse. What was the mood like talking to these experts?

I can only speak to what the doctor in the documentary said, but his thing was that there’s so much we don’t know about these drugs still. We know they cause seizures, but not really why, and we also know nothing about long term harms. He said if in 20 years people are showing up with massive kidney problems it could all be connected, but we really have no idea what the consequences will be.

Associate producer James Borrowdale and producer Ursula Williams. Image: Supplied.

Hand in hand with that, because of the illegality and underground market, it’s impossible to get a bead on what the current concoction is anyway. To me it doesn’t seem politically that there’s a lot happening in terms of reform. It’s almost been forgotten about in a sense.

It seems that way, doesn’t it? I know you’ve done some reporting on this, but there doesn’t seem to be huge political will to do something. Imagine if 20 people died in one year in some kind of industrial accident, or in the logging industry, there’d be an inquiry into exactly why. So it’s quite strange. There doesn’t seem to be that same level of urgency about this.

It’s astounding. If 25 people, heaps of them kids, dropped dead choking on their vomit from booze, it’d be a scandal.

The then-prime minister said last year something about personal responsibility being the best defence against this, and we’re sort of yet to see what the new government has done specifically or are thinking specifically on this. I can only hope that they’d take it a little more seriously or divert a little more attention that way.

I spoke to Ross Bell (of the NZ Drug Foundation) about this exact issue, and he explained that these are not designer drugs, they’re not the sort of drugs people use when there’s a lot of good things happening in their lives. These are drugs used by almost exclusively marginalised communities, and I wonder whether that’s part of the reason. If these were King’s College kids dropping dead, not kids out west, do you think it’d be different?

Yes, it’s no secret that synthetics, or synnyz, seem to predominately affect those communities, rough sleepers and lower income communities. If it was more affluent people probably there would be a bigger reaction, but every time I’ve put that to a minister they’ve always said ‘of course not, it’s the same for everyone’.

Yeah, well, they would say that. You’ve been working this beat for a while now. Based on what you’ve seen and learned, what would you say is the way forward? It almost feels like the legality of this stuff is besides the point.

There are two classic ways of looking at this. Under the Psychoactive Substances Act as it stands, manufacture and supply of this drug is a maximum two year sentence. I know there’s a bill in parliament at the moment that aims to increase that to eight years, bringing it in line with Class C under the Misuse of Drugs Act. That’s one way, and that’s very much the traditional deterrent. The other way would be to take another look at the Psychoactive Substances Act as a whole, giving it some of its power back, taking away some of the amendments that forbid animal testing and so on, which would be very much more of a regulatory and progressive attitude towards this issue. Then again, I don’t know if its too late for that now, because the underground market has continued unabated for so long. So it’s very hard to say.

That’s almost the feeling the documentary leaves you with. It doesn’t leave me filled with hope really.

No. And I guess Tammara’s story is tragic like that. She managed to stay clean for a bit, and then she relapsed. It’s obviously grim, but this is a grim drug, and our whole thing was that we wanted to tell these stories more than solve the issue singlehandedly. This is hopefully going to move the conversation forward, but as for what the actual solution will be, it’s hard to say.

If nothing else, it’s extremely clear that this is evil shit.

Most drugs you look at you can see that in the right situation they might be quite fun. Synthetics don’t seem to have any redeeming aspects at all.