It's not Truth, it's the Sunday News

By PHIL TAYLOR AND EUGENE BINGHAM

Executives of a newspaper caught inventing fictitious journalists and publishing their work are unapologetic and won't rule out continuing the practice.

Sunday News editor Clive Nelson said using made-up bylines was widespread and longstanding and would not bother readers. But media commentators say it is dishonest.

Sunday News was this week exposed by Australia's Media Watch programme putting the false byline "Ozzie Moore" on articles taken from newspapers across the ditch.

Media Watch gave examples of stories published in Australian newspapers including the Sydney Morning Herald, the Sun Herald and the Sunday Telegraph which later ran under Ozzie's byline in Sunday News.

Contacted by Media Watch, Nelson admitted Ozzie Moore was an "in-house byline".

"We've got Harry Pike, Pike as in fish, who's a writer from England and Martin La Cruz, he's American."

Media Watch was unimpressed: "In our judgment this is a case of straight-out deception - with Fairfax recycling their copy to save a few bucks."

Nelson told the Weekend Herald there were good reasons for using fake bylines - such as to protect staff reporters' sources or when a story was written by an overseas stringer who could not use his own name.

Articles written by Simon Jones, a British journalist who worked in Auckland for the Sunday News several years ago, appeared under the bylines of Ashok Patel and Gary Lawson.

"I don't think it's dishonest to the readers - I don't think the name means anything to anyone," said Nelson, a "media commentator" on Paul Holmes' NewstalkZB breakfast programme.

Asked why the Sunday News used bylines at all, he said it was for typographical reasons. "It's just part of the look of the page."

In future, the byline of the original author would appear on stories from Fairfax papers in Australia.

Fairfax New Zealand chief operating officer Peter O'Hara said he did not want to discuss the ethics of fake bylines and would not comment on whether the practice had the company's blessing but said Sunday News was entitled to use the articles.

There was a Fairfax Group arrangement to use stories from sister publications and use of the story from the Sunday Telegraph - owned by Fairfax rival News Ltd, was covered by an arrangement which News had with INL, whose New Zealand papers Fairfax bought last year.

News Ltd's group editorial manager, Warren Beeby, said the Sunday News agreement slipped through the cracks when News ended its supply contracts with INL's New Zealand papers as soon as Fairfax took them over last year.

"As soon as it was drawn to our attention we notified the Sunday paper that it had finished."

On the use of fake bylines, Mr Beeby said: "It's an abhorrent practice and we were shocked to discover it was being used on stories provided by News Ltd and we have taken appropriate action."

Media ethics expert Jim Tucker said it was dishonest.

"It comes down to that old thing of being dishonest to your readers. The average reader wouldn't know about it, and some wouldn't care, but its wrong.

"It's all to do with creating the impression that you are better than you are, that you've got more resources and a bigger reporting staff."

Canterbury University journalism school head Jim Tully said deception was damaging to the industry's credibility.

"Once you start playing fast and loose with the truth, you are on a slippery slope. Readers need to believe and trust that what they are reading is accurate and gathered by reasonable means."

One journalist whose work appeared in the Sunday News under Ozzie's byline said most Australian reporters did not realise there was a copy-sharing arrangement with sister papers in New Zealand, let alone that some stories were not being properly attributed.