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Report claims Australian freedoms waning

Legal restrictions and a culture of secrecy among public officials are eating away at free speech and media freedom in Australia, according to a report for the country's leading broadcasters and press released yesterday.

Citing 500 pieces of legislation and at least 1,000 court suppression orders that restricting reporting, its author Irene Moss concluded that there were grounds for concern that media freedom was being gradually reduced.

Moss, the former New South Wales ombudsman and former chair of the state's anti-corruption commission, said many mechanisms vital to a well-functioning democracy were "beginning to wear thin."

The report, commissioned by a coalition of major Australian media groups, including the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Rupert Murdoch's News Ltd, was presented as an "audit" on the issue.

"The audit would broadly conclude that free speech and media freedom are being whittled away by gradual and sometimes almost imperceptible degrees," said Moss at a launch ceremony. "As a result, I believe there are indeed grounds for concern."

Citing defensiveness and mistrust in government, she said many important institutions employed procedures more geared to reducing media risk than to fulfilling obligations of accountability.

Freedom of information laws did not always help, she said, while laws that protected journalists were inadequate and institutional support for whistle-blowers who expose corruption was "non-existent or flawed."

"Sometimes the freedom of information provisions which were intended to help people get information are used as an excuse to withhold it," she said.

While she did not see the situation as a crisis, Moss noted a "subtle shift" which she said meant that Australians should not take their democratic freedoms for granted.

"The greatest loss in this battle is not to the media but to the Australian people and their right to know about important matters that affect them," she said.
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