The ABC‘s national youth radio station, triple j, has a long history of supporting both Australian music and music which is rarely heard on commercial stations, but radio shock-jock Tom Elliott reckons taxpayers shouldn’t be funding triple j because commercial stations play exactly the same music.
In a Herald Sun opinion piece, Elliott calls the ABC “biased”, and suggests that its funding be cut to put it “back on the level”.
Taking aim at triple j, Elliott says that while the station is one of only a handful of stations which can be heard in rural Australia, its role in big cities “is far less obvious”.
Elliott then poses a simple but ill-informed question: “Why, for example, do we pay triple j to play youth-oriented pop/rock music when several commercial FM networks already cater to that audience?”
Elliott’s question suggests that a playlist as diverse as triple j‘s — which features everything from metal to pop, rock, electronic, hip hop, rap, indie and more — is mirrored in the music played by the likes of Nova, KIIS 106.5‘s Kyle & Jackie O and others, because that totally makes sense…
While Elliott believes that keeping triple j up-and-running is unnecessary, he also thinks ABC‘s AM talkback stations aren’t worth taxpayer funding either, because commercial stations like the one he works for are already doing their job for them.
“Commercial entities (such as 3AW [where Elliott hosts the Drive show]) already fill that niche,” he says. “Why should they have to fight for listeners with a taxpayer-subsidised broadcaster?”
Ironically, Elliott’s commercial radio-making skills where put into question last year when he conducted an on-air interview with an Aussie rapper who he thought was 360, but who turned out to be another rapper called BK Ultra.
The real 360 lapped up Elliott’s error and laughed pretty darn hard — just about as hard as we’re laughing at Elliott’s latest comments comparing triple j to commercial radio stations.
Triple j is yet to publicly comment on Elliott’s opinion piece, but you can view a selection a selection of choice responses to Elliott’s comments, below.
Poor Tom Elliott, forced to toe the News Ltd line on the ABC in today's 'Herald Sun'. Heart clearly not in it. Desperation evident.
— Tony Martin (@mrtonymartin) August 28, 2015
@TomElliott3AW did you really just compare triple j to nova, fox and austereo et al?
— davethescot* (@davehinnrichs) August 27, 2015
@TomElliott3AW comparing triple J to nova & co is like comparing you to a quality journalist #distant
— Tom Ryan (@Tommy_Ry) August 28, 2015
