Archbishop Anthony Fisher, OP, of Sydney has demanded an investigation from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) over its coverage of calls to lift the federal ban on using telehealth and other carriage services for voluntary assisted dying (VAD), as euthanasia and assisted suicide are termed in Australian law.
The Australian reported that in a letter to the ABC ombudsman, Fiona Cameron, he claimed the national broadcaster had breached its own guidelines on impartiality.
He asked the ombudsman whether its platforms "operated to amplify one side of a contentious policy debate."
VAD is legal throughout Australia apart from the Northern Territory, which is expected to pass enabling legislation soon.
However, a federal law banning advice about committing suicide over the phone or internet also bans telehealth consultations for VAD.
VAD advocate Andrew Denton — a former ABC television host, comedian, and founder of Go Gentle Australia — has campaigned to have the ban overturned.
Fisher cited four occasions in nine days in July when Denton promoted his views on ABC platforms. Three of them appeared before the Australian Labor Party's national conference in July, which supported an end to the federal ban on telehealth consultations.
In his letter, Fisher set out what he said was documentation of a failure by the ABC to present the contentious issue impartially.
He wrote: "Over a period of nine days the ABC repeatedly provided the founder of an organization established to advocate for euthanasia and assisted suicide law reform with opportunities across television, radio, online, and social media to make the case for amending a federal prohibition on the use of telehealth for euthanasia and assisted suicide."
"The principal arguments for retaining the prohibition were not put forward by those who hold them; rather, they were largely summarized or characterized by Denton," he said.
The imbalance is particularly significant, the bishop continued, "because three of the relevant items, as well as two associated social media posts, were published or broadcast in the four days immediately preceding an Australian Labor Party National Conference vote on the issue being advocated."
A subsequent ABC current affairs program interview occurred in the context of a foreshadowed parliamentary attempt to amend the law, Fisher added.
He stressed: "In those circumstances, providing an alternate perspective at some indefinite later time could not remedy the absence of diversity during the period in which the issue was the subject of an active and imminent political decision."
Given the "significance of the issue, the imminence of the political decisions to which the coverage related, and the ABC's particular obligation to maintain public confidence in its impartiality," Fisher asked that these matters be carefully investigated and addressed.
The archbishop also said Denton had misrepresented remarks he made in 2011 on "redemptive suffering."
"Denton omitted [my] immediately preceding response, which clearly states that the goal of the Catholic Church is to reduce suffering," he wrote in his letter to the ombudsman.
Responding to questions from The Australian, an ABC spokesman said a complaint had been received by the ombudsman's office.
This story was first published by The Catholic Weekly, the news outlet of the Archdiocese of Sydney, and is edited and republished by EWTN News with permission.
