I’m fumin’.

I’ve seen Frontline, so I know not to watch Today Tonight or A Current Affair and expect to see serious or accurate reporting. But last night Media Watch revealed just how far TT would go in the chase for ratings. This time, they’ve edited comments from Australian Muslims, leaving an impression of them as rejecting the Australian way of life.

The point the interviewee, Ahmed Haouchar, was trying to make concerned Muslims not integrating fully into Australian society because of issues such as it being against their religion to drink alcohol.

What he said: “We will never integrate, the way other communities integrate purely because of the fact that you have to draw a line with what your idea of integration is and what our idea of integration and accepting the practices of other people are.”

What went to air: “We will never integrate.”

This cut-off quote was used as the basis for the story and its promotion. In turn it stirred up the usual nest of bigots on 2UE and elsewhere. I fail to see how TT can justify this, it’s a complete fit-up. Classic Frontline, in fact.

• MediaWatch’s video and the transcript are here.

Well, there’s one bloke I shouldn’t expect a Christmas card from this year…

Maybe that came over as being a bit harsh, but it was an attempt to subvert what was essentially a fluffy publicity piece and provide a view of how well his ministry is actually performing.

Most people, including those who don’t use it, appreciate the advantages that public transport brings to our city. And while there have been some improvements in recent years, we’re playing catch-up.

It’s a little like walking up a down escalator. We’re moving at walking pace, but we really need to be moving faster to get anywhere, especially (to stretch the analogy further) when someone at the top of the escalator (the same government in fact) is pressing buttons to make it accelerate, by way of funding so much road network expansion.

Figures show that PT’s market share of travel isn’t really growing (sitting on about 9%, up only one point in the last four years), and certainly getting nowhere near doubling as the government claims to be aiming for with their 20/2020 target. And market share won’t grow substantially while so many people don’t have usable public transport.

As Graham Currie said yesterday in The Age’s liveability survey “People keep asking me why Melburnians don’t use public transport and I say, ‘because they haven’t got any’. Two-thirds of Melburnians don’t live near a train or tram, they only live near a bus.”

And we know how woeful the buses are. Until there’s a usable network covering the entire city, we’ll continue to be moving, but not getting very far.

See also:

• 5/5/2005: Environmentally unfriendly state budget
• 16/2/2005: Kyoto, transport, all that guff (transport FAQ)
• 4/6/2004: How I became a transport activist