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2Day FM broke law in airing Middleton hospital prank call, says Aussie media regulator
By Chris Cooke | Published on Monday 23 September 2013
The Australian radio station that aired a prank call to a hospital in London while it was caring for a then pregnant Kate Middleton “broke the law”, according to a report by the Australian Communications And Media Authority.
As much previously reported, the prank call on Southern Cross Austereo’s 2Day FM station became global news last December, with presenters Mel Greig and Michael Christian pretending to be the Queen and Prince Charles respectively. But the story took a tragic turn when one of the nurses tricked in the call, Jacintha Saldanha, took her own life shortly afterwards.
The UK’s Crown Prosecution Service decided not to press charges after investigating the incident, but the media regulator in Australia has seemingly concluded that Southern Cross Austereo did break Australian laws by airing the prank phone call without first getting the consent of those who featured in it.
The ACMA report is yet to be made public, but has come to light because of legal action being taken by the 2Day FM owner which is seemingly trying to stop the regulator from publishing the report at all, arguing that it has no power to rule that the media firm broke the law. Southern Cross Austereo says only a court can reach a criminal finding, and the Australian Federal Police are already investigating the incident.
As also previously reported, although both presenters went off the air after Saldanha’s death, Christian subsequently returned on a show on another Southern Cross Austereo station, and was somewhat controversially declared ‘Top Jock’ by the media firm back in June.
Greig, meanwhile, has not returned to the airwaves and is suing the broadcaster for failing to provide a safe workplace, presumably on the grounds it should have cleared the prank call before allowing it to be aired. It’s now thought she’ll also give evidence to the London inquest into Saldanha’s death.
