ABC 7.30 host Sarah Ferguson and Liberal senator Sarah Henderson clashed in the corridors of parliament late last month amid heightened tensions between the broadcaster and the opposition figure over a 2021 documentary about the January 6 insurrection.
Henderson, a former ABC 7.30 reporter and an ardent critic of the broadcaster, has pursued claims that the ABC had deliberately doctored Donald Trump’s January 6 Capitol speech in a Four Corners program titled Downfall (aired in 2021) directly after claims brought down two senior BBC executives over a documentary in November.
ABC 7.30 host Sarah Ferguson (left) and Victorian Liberal senator Sarah Henderson.Credit: SMH
The complaints against the ABC’s documentary were initially raised on Sky News Australia on November 10 and followed up in The Australian, with Henderson calling for an inquiry on November 11, leading to a rebuke by ABC managing director Hugh Marks and News boss Justin Stevens.
Henderson introduced the motion to the Senate two weeks later, on November 25, citing repeated breaches of impartiality. It was debated and subsequently voted down by a margin of 34-20 the following day.
On the day of the debate, and the same day the ABC held an annual showcase for politicians, the pair crossed paths. Ferguson, who fronted Downfall, told Senator Henderson to “get her facts right” over the allegations of doctored editing, said sources with knowledge of the encounter, who were not authorised to speak publicly.
Both Marks and Stevens backed the program, and when approached by this masthead, Ferguson declined to comment on the interaction directly but defended the program, saying that her “Four Corners stories speak for themselves”.
Henderson, meanwhile, criticised the nature of Ferguson’s approach, saying that while Parliament House is a place of robust debate, it “doesn’t ordinarily happen in the public corridors”.
“I take no issue with Sarah Ferguson disagreeing with my concerns about the editing of Downfall, but I was surprised by the vigorous nature of her representations,” she said.
“As I made clear, my door is always open to discuss the ABC’s statutory obligation to disseminate news and information impartially and accurately.”
