Farewell John, you will be Missed

Pete and I were among the approximately 500,000 New Zealanders who watched the final episode of Campbell Live on Friday night. It was a wonderful programme highlighting a multitude of topics the current affairs show has brought to the public’s attention over the past ten years. And that made the fact it was the final show all the more poignant. The public watching were well aware that the end of Campbell Live is really the end of prime time current affairs in New Zealand, other than certain Sunday evening programmes. It is also the end of a certain kind of current affairs programme; one which focuses on the underdog and exposing injustice in society.

When I started out my working life as a reporter many years ago, I did so with a good measure of idealism. As journalists, we were the ‘public watchdogs’ of society, a laudable role and one to be taken very seriously. And while I didn’t work as a journalist for all that long, it was long enough to have some of that idealism replaced with a certain among of realism and even cynicism – not always a good thing! That aside, I do remember learning the remarkable impact that can be made by bringing an injustice to the public’s attention.

There were numerous occasions where someone would be treated unfairly, perhaps by their employer, local government or another agency, and had not be able to get a remedy through their own efforts. Once I became aware and got involved through contacting the organization ‘as the local newspaper’ the situation almost always changed. The party at fault would work very hard to keep the situation out of the newspaper for a start. I would never go along with that, but would report on whatever had been done to address the situation. While I didn’t feel particularly powerful in relation to my personal status, I realized the power that comes through the media, and the benefits that arise from that being used to good ends.

I feel like John Campbell and his team were doing just that, but on a much greater scale. And they were doing it for ten years in a world where prime time television is driven by advertising ratings, and current affairs has always struggled for audiences. Some would say that the end of Campbell Live was inevitable. But that doesn’t stop it from being a sad day for good quality journalism and the exposure of injustice in New Zealand.