"She's a failure": Ita Buttrose cops direct spray from Michael Kroger
Liberal Party powerbroker Michael Kroger has urged ABC chairwoman Ita Buttrose to "just resign", revealing senior cabinet ministers regret ever putting her in the job.
In an epic spray on Sky News, Mr Kroger has described the businesswoman, founding editor of Cleo magazine and now Chairman of the ABC as "a failure" because the national broadcaster was anti-Liberal.
“Ita should resign,’’ Mr Kroger told Sky News.
“Ita has been a terrible failure. And I know there are many people in the Coalition, including people in the cabinet who regret her appointment.”
Ms Buttrose, a former Australian of the Year, was made an Officer of the British Empire (OBE) in 1979 and an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in 1998. She advanced to a Companion of the Order of Australia (AC) in 2019.
“She and some of those board members should go. She’s lost control of the Board. The Board has lost control of the managing director. The managing director has certainly lost control of news and current affairs,’’ Mr Kroger said.
Mr Kroger, who served on the ABC board for five years, said the ABC could not be reformed because the left-wing staff ran the organisation in defiance of any outside interference.
“The ABC staff are more powerful than ever,’’ he said.
Mr Kroger went on to describe various programs as throwing “political acid” in the Liberal Party’s face.
“They have weaponised Four Corners, Q&A in particular, which is like political acid in the face of the Liberal Party,’’ he said.
“It’s a shockingly biased program. The Drum, these current affairs shows are just weaponised against the Coalition.”
The Liberal Party powerbroker then claimed that the ABC's flagship current affairs program had investigated the "behaviour" of a senior ALP figure but had failed to publish a story.
“I mean Four Corners had evidence of behaviour of a senior Labor frontbencher that they have not put to air. They have not been put to air.
“They’ve got a lot of evidence. Now, they give the usual reasons I gather on the grapevine that, “Oh, well there wasn’t quite enough.
“Well, there wasn’t quite enough against Christian Porter. As they admitted the other day when they settled. And I take the view that Christian Porter did exceptionally well with this litigation. Because the ABC had to admit they were never able to prove this.”
Sky Host Chris Kenny proceeded to accuse Mr Porter of rape, which is he denies, saying it was “disgusting stuff to put into the public arena.”
Mr Kroger then ended the interview by again calling for Ms Buttrose to resign.
“She’s a failure. She should resign. You can’t get everything right in life. Morrison has got pretty much everything else right. But this was a bad appointment by the Coalition cabinet.”
“She’s been a hopeless failure. It’s more biased. This is like a train that has got no driver.”