5 hours Ago By Clare Rigden
It’s long been one of the ABC’s most popular shows, equally loved and loathed by journalists across the country. And now Media Watch is set for a shake-up, as award-winning investigative journalist Linton Besser takes the reins as host. Besser, a former foreign correspondent who has worked for Four Corners, Foreign Correspondent and 7.
30, has enjoyed a stellar career, picking up four Walkley Awards, two Kennedy Awards and a George Munster Award. He has also worked as a newspaper reporter and television documentary maker and has more than two decades experience traversing the media landscape. “I’m thrilled and sobered to be given the opportunity to host this important television program and hope to continue its great tradition,” Besser said in a statement.
“The media is big business and hugely influential. Its mission may be to hold others to account — but it too deserves the blowtorch..
. “Media Watch remains Australia’s best public guardrail against bad behaviour by the press.” Besser’s work has appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and The Bulletin, and has prompted public inquiries, including a Royal Commission, “plus corruption findings and criminal prosecutions for business identities, politicians and public officials,” a statement said.
He picks up hosting duties from the show’s most recent — and longest-running — frontman, Paul Barry, whose last show will go to air on December 2. Besser is the latest in a long line of well-regarded journalists who have sat in the hot seat, including Barry, Jonathon Holmes, Richard Ackland, David Marr, Liz Jackson, Monica Attard and Stuart Littlemore, who have all stepped in as hosts since the show’s beginnings in 1989. Besser will join Media Watch next year, with his first episode set to air on Monday February 3.
Investigative reporter and Gold Walkley winner Mario Christodoulou will join him as the show’s new Executive Producer, replacing Tim Latham, who steps down at the end of the year. Dylan Caporn Dylan Caporn.
