Foot in Mouth

Here is the George Negus introduction to the story broadcast on SBS TV. You can actually watch it here.

"Every now and then in this business, a story comes along that leaves you shaking your head and asking, 'How on earth could they have ever allowed this to happen?'

Well, what you're about to see falls squarely into that stunned and amazed category. Essentially, it's a story of how bureaucrats in Canberra gave the green light to beef imports from Brazil - a country with a history of the dreaded foot-and-mouth disease.

Peter Martin has been investigating a decision that risked a $13-billion catastrophe."

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Ricardo Semler - Brazil's Caring Capitalist

Ricardo Semler - Brazil's Caring Capitalist was the subject of a quick and surprising story while on location for SBS TV in Brazil. (There is a video link too)

George Negus's introduction:

With John Howard proposing radical changes to this country's industrial relations system - a look at a very different system with a very different boss on the other side of the world.

In Brazil, on the factory floor and in the office, workers at the SEMCO manufacturing and services conglomerate pretty much call their own shots. Some might call it Anarchic Socialism, maybe others, cutting-edge capitalism - whatever, it's certainly paying financial dividends.

Indeed, it's so successful that it's unorthodox "worker participation" approach is being extended to other fields as well.

Well you might ask is there anything this bold Brazilian experiment could teach us here in Australia? Imagine if you will, students sacking their teachers!

SBS economics correspondent Peter Martin starts his report in exotic Rio.

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Johns Hopkins University: strange goings on downunder

This is as odd a story as I have ever had to tell.

As George Negus said in the introduction to the half-hour report on SBS Dateline:


When Australian medical entrepreneur Peter Osborne became involved with a representative of Johns Hopkins University in the United States and promoted a new online health care system for Australia with him, he thought his future looked rosy. Now, several years later he is facing financial ruin, governments in Australia have been misled and there are serious allegations of impropriety leveled against the project. SBS business reporter Peter Martin investigates a corporate intrigue that stretches across three continents.


Read about Johns Hopkins University or watch the video for an amazing and disturbing ride.

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OutFoxed: Rupert Murdochs War on Journalism

He's my SBS Dateline report on OutFoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism. Watch it here.

And gee it was fun to see the US during the Republican National Convention, and witness a protest march and chanting against a news organisation!

Here's George Negus's introduction:


In the US, the presidential election campaign is now entering the home straight. And there is one man who may well determine the result - Rupert Murdoch, who owns what has become one of the most influential news outlets in the country.

Fox News is now the highest rating cable news network in the States.

But it is winning enemies as well, with critics claiming it is taking journalism to new lows with its outrageous bias in favour of the Republican Party.

Peter Martin has more.

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The Four Billion Dollar Man - update

SBS TV's Dateline reported on Commercial IBT on Wednesday 10 March 2004.

Ratings Agency of Malaysia has just made this announcement.

23 April 2004

RAM has suspended the AA1/P1 ratings of Commercial IBT Pty Ltd pending the outcome of an investigation on the Company by the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (“ASIC”).

ASIC itself has yet to make an announcement.

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Paul Krugman - The Fly in Bush's Ointment

My SBS Dateline interview with Paul Krugman. 

Mark Davis's introduction:

Now to one of George Bush's most persistent critics. Until the emergence of Democrat leader John Kerry, Paul Krugman had virtually become the leader of the opposition in America, an unusual position for an academic economist. His column on business and economics in the New York Times soon broadened into a scathing critique. Not only did he attack George Bush's economic record, but almost alone in the US media until recently, he became known as a vocal critic of the Bush social and political agenda as well. Paul Krugman has been speaking with our economics correspondent, Peter Martin...

STATE OF THE UNION: Members of Congress, I have the high privilege and the distinct honour of presenting to you the President of the United States.

PROFESSOR PAUL KRUGMAN, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY: They've made no secret, the Administration doesn't say this but the people behind it do, that they view the whole welfare state, social security and Medicare as illegitimate. They want to reverse the New Deal and the Great Society, which means get rid of the house that Franklin Roosevelt built. On the social-cultural religious side, they've made it very clear that the boundaries between Church and State are something that they want to tear down.

PETER MARTIN: Paul Krugman the 'New York Times' columnist is as blunt, and fearless, in his observations about the Bush Administration as Paul Krugman, the Princeton trade theorist, used to be about entire national economies. Back in the mid-1990s, at a time when just about everyone was talking up the Asian economic miracle, Krugman labelled it a myth. Three years later, those miracle economies collapsed.
Now, with a twice-weekly column in America's most influential newspaper, the economist and opinion writer has begun issuing similar warnings about the US itself.

PAUL KRUGMAN: As a share of GDP, our budget deficit is bigger than Argentina's before the 2001 crack up, as a share of GDP our current account deficit is bigger than Indonesia's before the 1997 crack up. Advanced countries get the benefit of the doubt from financial markets, because advanced countries are presumed to have the political will and the technical ability to resolve these very serious budget problems. We have the technical ability, I don't think politically we have any realistic discussion on the table.

PETER MARTIN: The political problem that Krugman points to again and again in his columns is the Administration's multi trillion-dollar unfunded tax cut. He says it's sending American tax collections to their lowest level since the 1950s. In their place are borrowings from Asian central banks. He's worried even more by the attitude of the Administration that has pushed those tax cuts.

PAUL KRUGMAN: The same tax cut that was proposed in 1999 at a time of surplus, at a time of a thriving economy, was the one that they pushed through in 2001 in the face of recession, and was extended and enlarged in the face of record budget deficits. The policy of tax cuts at the high end, permanent tax cuts at the high end, they sold it different ways, various things at various times, but it's always the same policy even though the economic situation and the budget situation is completely transformed.

PETER MARTIN: Krugman's critique of the Bush Administration now extends way beyond its approach to economics. He says in all sorts of areas it appears to regard itself as a revolutionary force not subject to the usual political decision-making process.

PAUL KRUGMAN: On foreign policy, they always wanted to get Saddam Hussein, and the fact that it was actually somebody else who attacked us didn't seem to make a difference. They decided, you know, the satirists do a better job of describing reality than serious journalists these days. And one satirist said that we sent a message to the world - "If you attack us, we will strike back with overwhelming force at someone else."

And the notion that there could be a legitimate transfer of power back to the Democrats simply doesn't occur to these people. A number of people who are closely connected with the Republican Party from the religious right have said: "God chose Bush to be President, even exulted over the fact that he became President with fewer votes than his opponent, saying that just shows that he was God's choice." Almost a kind of right-wing Leninism. These are people who really have a very strong view about the way things should be, and are determined to achieve it.

REPORTER: Are these sort of attitudes, dangerous ones in your view, that are easy to report on?

PAUL KRUGMAN: The very extremism of what's going on makes it very difficult for journalists to talk about what's happening.

REPORTER: Why is that?

PAUL KRUGMAN: Because the convention, if you're at 'Fox News', if you're with Murdoch, then the right wing is always right. If you are at another mainstream news source then the conventions is that there are two sides to every story, and it doesn't matter if one side is grotesquely untruthful, there are still two sides to every story. So, well, we had a spectacular example just a couple of days ago, we had new poll numbers which happen to have been shockingly bad for Bush, and most of the headlines in mainstream news reports on it had something like, "Poll shows weaknesses in both parties." And I've said that if Bush said that the earth was flat, the reporting in much of the mainstream press would be, "Shape of earth views differ."

REPORTER: Why do you think you are not bound by those conventions in your writing?

PAUL KRUGMAN: Well, first off, I am an opinion columnist. I have a little more... I write what I like, but beyond that I have another job. If my outrageousness causes me to lose my journalistic career, well so, I'll go back teaching and other things and so, I'm a little, and also I think I was just, because I am a trained economist, and can do my own arithmetic, I caught on to the fact that there was a lot of just raw dishonesty going on in this Administration before anyone else did, and have had the courage of my convictions because they're just grounded in arithmetic, which gives me a certain advantage over other people, but I'm much less alone than I was.

PETER MARTIN: In recent weeks, Krugman has swung back to economics in his columns, warning of a financial crisis in the US very soon, quite possibly within the next 4-year presidential term.

PAUL KRUGMAN: If the markets were to believe in us until the last possible moment we could have another 15 years before all hell breaks loose. I don't think it's going to work that way, but it could certainly happen during the next four years.

PETER MARTIN: Might this be a good election for the Democrats to lose, in other words, to let George Bush deal with the results of what you see as the coming results of his Administration's policies?

PAUL KRUGMAN: Well, I'll give you several thoughts on that. First was, that a lot of Democrats said during the disputed election of 2000, "Well, you know, whoever gets this is going to be handed a poisoned chalice, so it's probably better for us to let Bush have it," and that turned out to have been stark-raving mad, it turns out that the advantages of incumbency, the advantages of holding the White House are enormous, and Bush exploited that absolutely to the fullest, so, look, don't knock the advantage of being there. In particular, given the way things are trending in the United States, given the raw use of power to rig the political game that the Republicans have undertaken already, given the replacement of voting machines with electronic machines that leave no paper trail, given the extraordinary use of patronage to reward friends and punish enemies in the business community, I'm not sure that if the Democrats lose this election, they're going to have any chance of mounting a challenge in any future election no matter how badly things go.

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The four billion dollar man

For the two months or so I have been working on a story which went to air on SBS TV's Dateline on Wednesday 10 March. As you can see if you follow the link there is no transcript on the SBS site "on legal advice".

The story is about an Australian company, Commercial IBT Pty Ltd. It has a banking licence in the offshore financial centre of Labuan, Malaysia. It describes itself and the bank this way...

COMMERCIAL IBT BANK, Licensed Offshore Bank (030085C), a licensed bank in Labuan Malaysia (www.lofsa.gov.my) is involved in investment banking and provision of financial services including corporate finance and advisory, private banking, trade finance and fund and asset management.

We provide innovative financial solutions, support and auxiliary services ONLY to wholesale clients, sophisticated investors, substantial corporations and institutions globally.

Our commercial and entrepreneurial approach has seen success in our specialist divisions.

We have a good network in the Australia-Pacific, Asian and United States regions and specialise in providing investment opportunities in these regions.

We strictly observe and preserve our clients' confidentiality and as such we are very private. We therefore do not publicise nor advertise any deals or projects unless requested by our clients.

In Australia, COMMERCIAL IBT is a low profile financial institution involved in corporate finance, general investments and other financial services. For further information please go to www.cibt.com.au

We are a full member of the Asian Bankers Association (ABA). The Asian Bankers Association, one of the service councils of the Confederation of Asia Pacific Chambers of Commerce and Industry, is a regional association and membership of financial institutions based or have operations in the Australia Asia-Pacific region. The Association aims to provide a forum for advancing the cause of the banking and finance industry in the region and promoting regional economic cooperation.

Or that's what it used to say.

The morning after my story went to air that description vanished from its website, replaced with: "This page is currently being updated". Here is what is there now.

The website for Commercial IBT is here. The homepage for the bank here.

UPDATE 23.04.04:

Ratings Agency Malaysia suspends Commercial IBT's rating.

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Stealing money from very rich people.

It is so easy. A senior official at the Australian Securities and Investments Commission shared his theory as to why. These self-made businesspeople get rich by handshakes, one on one deals, and deals that are out of the ordinary. They get rich by letting their defences down.

We considered calling the SBS Dateline version of this story NABed because of the bit part played by Australia's National Australia Bank in the swindle.

In the end we called it The Big Sting. Read the transcript, or watch the hard-to-believe story.

Mark Davis's introduction:

The collapse of New York's twin towers two years ago tomorrow also marked the collapse of an international swindle that stole millions from some very prominent Australians. Not that many of them are keen to talk about it. Nor is the National Australia Bank, where the funds were deposited. Peter Martin reports. (Includes footage from The Profiteers, by Studio Hamburg Documentaries)

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