ABC policy is unfair

It is deplorable and quite unfair that only parliamentary parties are given free airtime on TV by our public broadcaster, the ABC.

All registered parties participating in the federal election ought to be given equal time to put the principal points of their program before the voting public.

The way it is done, and has been done for a long time, favours the parliamentary parties grossly.

It is clearly biased in favour of the status quo.

Non-parliamentary parties already have great difficulty in receiving any coverage from mainstream commercial media and generally do not have the financial clout to buy much advertising space.

I have on a number of occasions pointed this out to the ABC and received encouraging responses.

But nothing has in fact been done to correct this plainly discriminatory and undemocratic situation.

I am on the NSW Committee of the Friends of the ABC and generally defend the ABC and its excellent programs.

But there is work to be done here and, hopefully, before the 2004 election takes place.

Klaas Woldring, Pearl Beach Senate candidate, Progressive Labour Party September 29