P*ss off! – Laws 'charm offensive' continues

Shock jock Michael Laws continued his charm offensive against New Zealand journalists today.

The controversial former MP has had his knuckles rapped by broadcasting watchdogs for saying Herald on Sunday journalists were “rabid” and should be shot.

His comments resulted in him being taken off air.

Today, when seeking a reaction to the judgment, Mr Laws hung up on a National Business Review journalist.

Moments later, after phoning him back, Mr Laws, who is on a family holiday in Wanganui, told him to “P*ss off!”

The Broadcasting Standards Authority upheld a complaint over his comments yesterday afternoon but declined to take action against him, believing publication of the judgment was sufficient punishment.

The BSA confirmed it had received eight complaints against Mr Laws since 2008 - three of them were upheld and five were not.

Mr Laws made the comments on his talkback radio programme during the height of the general election campaign on November 18 when raising the issue of the “tea tapes”.

“We are discussing this morning, really one of the great issues of the campaign, but unfortunately you won’t have to hear it because the media have gone mad, rabid.

"If I had a gun I’d shoot them, put them out of their misery, because they have gone rabid and may affect others,” he said.

“And that’s the one thing about the media, have you noticed? That one, the Herald on Sunday, for example, which is rabid all the time, no idea why somebody just hasn’t taken a shotgun there and cleaned out the entire newsroom.

"But the infection has spread, so it goes to the Herald, of course it does, and it infected TV3. Well, they’re in Auckland – of course it does, and then it sort of spreads from there.

“This is the reason why, if you see a rabid journalist, you shoot them straight away, and then the infection doesn’t spread.

"But look at them now, you know they’re all completely mad, so you know, you just lay your bait, put down a bit of cyanide somewhere in a newsroom, and you hope there isn’t too much collateral birdlife that’s killed,” he said.

However, complainant Simon Blissett of Ashburton said such “general derogatory remarks [that] all news media should be shot” and the host “encouraging mass murder” breached standards over good taste and decency and rules concerning law and order and violence.

Such a view was backed by three of four authority members. However, a complaint with regard to breaching law-and-order guidelines was not upheld.

The BSA said it saw the complaint as one where boundaries needed to be set.

“We think the broadcaster went over the boundary. Having endeavoured to mark the boundary more clearly, and expecting  broadcasters to take more care in the future we do not consider that any order is warranted,” it said.

The judgment also noted there are greater restrictions regarding what is said on the radio, as opposed to in private.

“Expressing in detail the view that specific people should be killed to a point where it has gone beyond mere colloquialism, and gone beyond humour and metaphor, is in our view a step too far,” it said.

“The majority therefore affirm our decision that the complaint should be upheld under Standard 1 (good taste and decency), but we respect the views of the minority on these matters of judgment.”

Mediaworks said today they were not making any kind of appeal with regards to the BSA judgment, and because of how radio audiences are measured with ‘sweeps’ taking place in April and October, it could not determine any impact Mr Law’s comments might have had on ratings.

Spokeswoman Rachel Lorimer confirmed Mr Laws was off the air for around six weeks following the November 18 comments, with his missing out on covering the rest of the 2011 General Election campaign.

The National Business Review understands he was “taken off the air” while “issues” were worked through.

At the time, Mediaworks issued the following statement:

“Radio Live and Michael Laws have been involved in ongoing discussions relating to his radio show. The matters have now been resolved and Michael will return to his 9am-12pm show after the holidays on Monday January 9th 2012.

Neither party will be making any further comment on the matter, except to say we are both pleased the matter has been resolved.”

The full BSA decision can be read at: http://www.bsa.govt.nz/decisions/show/4363