Gerard Henderson moves column from The Sydney Morning Herald to The Australian
Gerard Henderson
The Sydney Institute executive director Gerard Henderson is to move his weekly Sydney Morning Herald column to rival The Australian after 23 years with Fairfax Media.
Henderson’s departure to News Corp comes after the SMH’s editor in chief Darren Goodsir suggested he reduce his weekly column to fortnightly.
Goodsir said in an email to staff: “I felt that such a move would allow for a range of new voices to be heard in our print opinion pages and websites, while still allowing Gerard’s unique commentary to also reach its audience. However, Gerard has opted for a different path and I respect that decision.”
Henderson will run his column in The Australian every week from next week, and his weekly Media Watch Dog will also be hosted on The Australian’s website every Friday, The Australian reported.
Henderson worked at The Australian from 1987 to 1989, and said it is nice to be returning to the News Corp publication after a quarter century break, adding his departure from Fairfax Media was amicable and Goodsir had been “very gracious”.
Goodsir said Peter Reith, a former minister in the Howard government, will join the Sydney Morning Herald as a columnist.
“This is part of a range of initiatives aimed at meeting the changing demands of our ever-growing audiences, in digital and print,” Goodsir said in the email to staff.
“More announcements will be made shortly. Peter is a no-nonsense, policy-focused commentator who is making quite a name for himself on The Drum and Sky television through critiquing the government’s performance from a conservative perspective. He will be a great addition to our fine array of columnists – and I welcome him to the Herald,” he added.
Best move Gerard Henderson could make as the SMH has a huge left wing pro Labor bias in its reporting structure and amongst it many reporters. The SMH is not what it used to be when you could depend on it for accuracy and being unbiased in its reporters.
User ID not verified.
Conservative commentator moves to conservative newspaper.
I am shocked I tell you! Shocked!
User ID not verified.
This is a bad move by Fairfax. To be fair, Henderson and Sheehan are just about the only thing stopping the SMH from falling into the abyss of the Green Left or some university rag. And Henderson’s going to get drowned out at The Oz with all their other right-wingers.
User ID not verified.
I can’t stand Henderson’s politics, but what made his column particularly unreadable was that it was pretty much the same every time: nearly always ending up with the conclusion, “it’s the ABC wot dun it”.
User ID not verified.
Lol “Peter is a no-nonsense, policy-focused commentator who is making quite a name for himself on The Drum and Sky television through critiquing the government’s performance from a conservative perspective” conservative critiquing the Abbott govt? Give me a break, as Reith would say
User ID not verified.
Mark – How the hell does the SMH have a “pro labour” bias? Which paper has forced numerous ICAC hearings into Labor MPs due to its coverage?! Get your facts right. Sorry you are already a right winger that’s why you are a parrot for the usual Mumbo jumbo about Fairfax and the ABC.
The ideology lies with you not the SMH or Fairfax.
User ID not verified.
Yeah Bruce. And Reith is not a right-wing loonie eh. One out … one in … all square. Better off with ’em all gone.
User ID not verified.
Mark – are you joking? Fairfax is pretty damn balanced. Regardless, how on Earth could one view a move from Fairfax to NEWS CORP as heading to a more even-handed company? News Corp isn’t even apologetic about its bias.
User ID not verified.
Al, you only see what you want to see, champ.
It has a massive Green/Left bias – to put it more accurately than Mark.
But how’s the ed’s comment that cutting Henderson’s output in half would “allow for a range of new voices to be heard in our print opinion pages and websites”.
What he really means is: “new voices exactly like all the others we already have – those who fit in with our ideological view of the world”.
A decision to the SMH’s detriment, I believe.
User ID not verified.
“the only thing stopping the SMH from falling into the abyss of the Green Left”
Given what you mean by “the Green Left” as in the strangely-infintely printed ‘newspaper’ of the DSP, have you even read Green Left Weekly?
Mind you, it is better than ‘Spartacist’, in that they understand paragraphs exist for a reason, and John Pilger is a fan of GLW (I have no idea why, but that’s him), but if you were being truthful, you would know that GLW can never not be investigative without linking everything to one solution.
When is the last time you heard SMH in its lifestyle section, like today, “European homewares to lust after” or “Baby boy for Kate Winslet” say that in the end, no matter if the boy’s last name is Rocknroll after his dad, the masses must overthrow capitalism!
Plus, how does it get printed every year without fail? Has anyone done a report on the DSPs finances? Hasn’t someone gone broke yet?
User ID not verified.
Who cares? Henderson and his mutt will join a chorus of baying hounds at the Oz. But the Herald still has way too many columns and way too few people turning over rocks. Give Kate McClymont a dozen eager beavers to get it all rolling, I say!
User ID not verified.
The editor says he wants “a range of new voices” on his opinion pages but decides to punt one of the conservative voices that isn’t Green left-leaning, dripping wet. No wonder Fairfax is hurtling towards oblivion..
Who really gives a damn about the opinions of this neoliberal quotemeister.
User ID not verified.
It’s coming to the point that there will be very few journalists left at Fairfax – all their content is being imported from other sources.
User ID not verified.
Robbie – what does massive “Green/Left” bias mean? Its a meaningless school boy debating term used by the News limited porpoises as they clap their keyboards to get their daily fish feed.
The SMH is a classic voice of the mild mannered middle class. A bastion of foodie addicts and private school aspirationals. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But hardly the breeding ground of hard core socialists and enviro warriors.
User ID not verified.
Great move! Now almost no-one will have to be exposed to Gerard’s thoughts again.
User ID not verified.
Where did you get the idea that Gerard Henderson was a “journalist” . PPPPlease
User ID not verified.
Gerard is just moving to a newspaper outfit with about as much future left as he has. None.
User ID not verified.
Mark – you may be mensa, but you come across as moron http://www.smh.com.au/business.....2z5dc.html
User ID not verified.
Fairfax have shifted dramatically in the last 6 years and the readers are responding
User ID not verified.
Robbo. Your comment “you only see what you want to see” seems to have been written by you in the first person. Either that or there are two SMHs.
The one I read is (rightly) critical of both Labor and Liberal and generally plays it pretty much down the middle. Though your definition of “the middle” is probably akin to where the Australia-Indonesia boundary was drawn during the East Timor oil deals. Oh, and look who is replacing him. Speaking of East Timor .. none other than Peter Reith himself!
User ID not verified.
I can’t wait for the years to pass to empirically show that Henderson, Divine, Bolt, Ackerman et al were totally wrong about everything they write about every day.
I hate the SMH as well, by the way, but for different reasons.
User ID not verified.
All newspaper editors want is reaction – any reaction – as they fumble about while their publications continue to slash staff and slowly sink into irrelevance. Hard right gibberers like Divine, Bolt, Ackerman, Planet Janet, Henderson and Sheehan repeat the same old same old as they give it to the lefties year after year while Carlton, FitzSimons, Farrelly, Pilger, and an endless supply of squishy lefties, many on the ABC payroll, return fire. It’s become really boring – and it just goes on and on. These clueless editors comfort themselves with the thought that if their mouths-for-hire can spark a couple of hundred outraged comments they’re somehow providing worthwhile journalism. Pension off the lot of these overpriced keyboard warriors and give us a couple more Kate McClymonts who will actually get out in the real world and uncover the real stories about what’s an increasingly fraught society.
User ID not verified.
With his constant carping about ABC bias lefties and inner west luvvies Henderson should have earned himself the moniker Granny Herald. Well granny’s left the building and I say good riddance.
User ID not verified.
What a plus for the SMH. For a long time Henderson has been so totally one eyes he has become a joke. In the News Limited stable he will be hard to spot in amongst all the other one eyed nutters writing for the mad right. Circulation of the SMH will go up.
User ID not verified.
Won’t be missed. He’s been a broken record for years now and as such has in no way enhanced the paper’s pages.
User ID not verified.
Amazing! The SMH replaces one of their right-wingers with another right-winger, and various dolts accuse it of “Left-wing bias” for edging the first one out. Whatever the case, I didn’t often read Henderson, because a) it was a secret who funded his “Institute”, so I didn’t know whose thoughts he was representing, and b) anyone who must always be “right-wing” in their views, as expected of them, is utterly, pointlessly predictable. That goes for Bolt, Devine, et al. (And to the person who misspelt her name “Divine”… No! That’s just so wrong.)
The same goes for the commentators who must always be “left-wing” – but seriously, they are a far smaller group.
User ID not verified.