Kerre Woodham: Media distrust lucky for PM

Dear me. The Prime Minister really hasn't coped terribly well when talking off the cuff. Photo / Dean Purcell

When it comes to the Reader's Digest annual trustworthiness and respect ratings of professions, journalists and politicians are right down the bottom - lower than a snake's underpants.

The public trust neither journos nor politicians and don't believe a word either group says. And this unseemly spat between the Prime Minister and various media organisations certainly won't help improve their ratings.

In one corner you have a couple of cocky politicians calling a media conference to announce they'll be sitting down over a cup of tea as a signal that National will be backing the Act candidate for Epsom.

The two Johns, Key and Banks, parade like show ponies for the cameras before the media scrum is banished and then begin their staged conversation, with nothing but a pane of glass between them and the media, and nothing at all between themselves and the rest of the cafe patrons.

I don't know what was discussed, although this newspaper has a transcript of the conversation. But I have no doubt Don Brash was a topic and it appears snide comments were made about Winston Peters and his support base.

When it was discovered that the conversation had been inadvertently recorded by a freelance cameraman, the microphone was confiscated by the PM's security staff and Key shrugged off any concerns by saying nothing of much consequence was discussed.

But as his political opponents demanded he release the tape of the conversation, so voters knew what to expect if they voted in Banks and a coalition was formed between National and Act, the PM turned feral. He likened the recording to News of the World tactics, called in the police and claimed he was preventing us all hurtling down a slippery slope.

Imagine, he said, if a high-profile couple was discussing their suicidal son or daughter and their conversation was taped and a Sunday newspaper reported those details and that child committed suicide ... Er, yes. Imagine. What an unusual analogy, and nothing at all to do with a couple of political animals milking a photo opportunity for all it was worth.

Key has given the storm in a tea cup another burst of life by calling in the police, who have warrants to seize documents from media organisations. But it was a bizarre comment from Key that really raised eyebrows: he wasn't wasting police resources, he claimed, because under National the crime rate had lowered by 7 per cent so police had a bit of spare time.

Dear me. The Prime Minister really hasn't coped terribly well when talking off the cuff.

In the other corner, though, are the media. And few people trust or respect us. We are ghouls preying on human misery. We are beat-up merchants, turning a minor incident into front-page news. We have no respect for privacy, we are unscrupulous and would sell our own grandmothers to sell a few papers. So when a member of the media proclaims the taping of a conversation was an innocent mistake, people see one half of a Tui billboard.

Ultimately, National's lead in the polls is such that this will be a minor bump in its campaign.

But Key hasn't handled this well and it's only the public's even lower opinion of journalists that has prevented more damage.