Close Up mistake management 'not good PR'

Mark Sainsbury apologised to viewers for the item, saying 'we let you down'. Photo / Supplied

Close Up's turnaround and eventual admission it copied an American affiliate's story was not a good look, according to media veteran Brian Edwards.

The TVNZ current affairs show's actions were picked up by Herald columnist Ana Samways, who revealed a story, entitled Made in New Zealand, was virtually identical to an item on the American network ABC in January.

Last night, Close Up apologised for the story.

"A story we screened on Thursday night was inspired by a similar concept produced by our affiliate ABC America," Close Up host Mark Sainsbury said.

"Unfortunately, the story produced took the inspiration too far, a fact we were rightly picked up on.

"How it happened is a matter being thoroughly investigated, but we are disappointed that it happened, as we set high journalistic standards for ourselves.

"Let's be frank, we let you down, and for that we apologise."

Last night's apology followed a statement from TVNZ on Friday which defended the story.

"We found a Kiwi family and conducted the same experiment here, as we are perfectly entitled to do under our affiliation agreement."

"Like ABC America, Close Up has had an incredible response from viewers on our Made In NZ series and have several other stories planned."

Mr Edwards said the turn-around was not a good look, but they got it right in the end.

"What I can say as someone who is a media consultant is that its a good thing that they made this apology on the programme, I think that is always a good thing to do, what isn't so good is it was done the wrong way around.

"It's not a good look to start off saying there is nothing wrong with what we did and we were perfectly entitled to do it, which was what the original statement said, and then three days later ... say 'whoops, we did something really bad and we are really sorry'.

"The handling of it, in those terms - in what you might call PR terms, is not good, but it came right in the end."

He did not know what happened, but guessed the initial statement was put out by the broadcaster's communications department, before further consideration was made further up the chain.

Mr Edwards believed it unlikely the same mistake would be made again.

"Sometimes there is a very good lesson to be learned from things and I would be very astonished if it happened again. I don't think it would happen again.

"What I am inclined to think, we've seen too much of people being sacked ...for things that are simply mistakes and obviously someone has made a mistake here and no doubt were given a thorough telling off, whoever it was, I'm inclined to think it should be left at that."