\u201cThey crossed the line from factual reporting to exaggeration, misinterpretations, and outright falsities.\u201d<\/p>\n
Both parties have employed high-profile lawyers.<\/p>\n
Talley\u2019s is represented by Dickey, the former Crown Solicitor for Auckland.<\/p>\n
Lawyer for Talleys Brian Dickey in the High Court at Auckland. Photo \/ Dean Purcell<\/p>\n
TVNZ has retained the services of Davey Salmon, KC.<\/p>\n
Attesting to the significance of the case to both parties, TVNZ chief executive Jodi O\u2019Donnell and Talley\u2019s director, Peter Talley, observed the first day\u2019s proceedings from the public gallery.<\/p>\n
The six stories, all of which led the 6pm bulletin, and ran between July 2021 and May 2022, were played in full to the court on the first day of trial.<\/p>\n
The stories made allegations about substandard health and safety practices at Talley\u2019s plants in Ashburton and Blenheim, and the agribusiness\u2019s mismanagement of accident compensation run under the ACC opt-out Accredited Employer programme.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe overriding messages from this series was that the Ashburton plant was unsafe, and Talley\u2019s management doesn\u2019t care,\u201d Dickey said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe stories were irresponsible advocacy journalism \u2026 that may be a mark of television news but it does not provide a defence to defamation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lawyer for TVNZ Davey Salmon in the High Court in Auckland. Photo \/ Dean Purcell<\/p>\n
Salmon told the court TVNZ and Mead rejected the claims, and would be defended on the grounds the stories were true and the result of responsible journalism about matters of public interest.<\/p>\n
In written opening submissions, Salmon said Talley\u2019s claim was also hampered by the company\u2019s poor reputation.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt operates in many small communities, with limited opportunities. A significant portion of its workforce are migrants and seasonal workers.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe group also has a long history of health and safety convictions and hostility to union activities on its sites, and a reputation that reflects that,\u201d Salmon said.<\/p>\n
Salmon said the use of anonymous sources was an important tool for journalism and arguments by Talley\u2019s that their use discredited the defence of responsible publication was dangerous.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf it\u2019s said that a responsible publication should be stymied because a journalist honours those promises [for anonymity] protected under the Evidence Act, then the defence is emasculated, it\u2019s expired,\u201d Salmon said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat vital last part of journalistic media requires them to hear from anonymous sources and honour their trust.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dickey signalled Talley\u2019s would be calling former police commissioner Mike Bush as a witness.<\/p>\n
Bush, now the commissioner of police for Victoria, was in 2021 engaged as a consultant by Talley\u2019s to investigate allegations about the Ashburton plant made in Mead\u2019s initial run of reporting.<\/p>\n
Salmon signalled former Herald editor Dr Gavin Ellis would be giving evidence as to best practice in newsroom management and verification of information provided by anonymous sources.<\/p>\n
Talley\u2019s is suing state-owned TVNZ and Mead personally.<\/p>\n
Dickey said Talley\u2019s was not seeking damages, but rather was seeking to clear its name with a declaration that the stories were defamatory.<\/p>\n
If Talley\u2019s case succeeds, TVNZ and Mead will still be liable to cover their opponents\u2019 costs.<\/p>\n
The trial continues and is scheduled to run for four weeks.<\/p>\n
Matt Nippert is an Auckland-based investigations reporter covering white-collar and transnational crimes and the intersection of politics and business. He has won more than a dozen awards for his journalism \u2013 including twice being named Reporter of the Year \u2013 and joined the Herald in 2014 after having spent the decade prior reporting for business newspapers and national magazines.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThey crossed the line from factual reporting to exaggeration, misinterpretations, and outright falsities.\u201d Both parties have employed high-profile…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":23197,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9092,11154,138,1121,1349,23948,9872,564,6276,2959,78,2514,23951,23949,111,43,139,69,1240,23950,23947,417,6445,102,80],"class_list":["post-23196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-against","tag-begins","tag-business","tag-case","tag-court","tag-defamation","tag-finally","tag-food","tag-gets","tag-high","tag-in","tag-island","tag-longbrewing","tag-mega","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-south","tag-squaring","tag-talleys","tag-television","tag-tvnz","tag-with","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23196"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23196\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23197"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}