Who's been watching the watchers? Australian political journalism

The Prime Minister John Howard articulated the high value most Australians place on a free press, when he defended Australia’s human rights record on television describing Australia as a ‘gold-plated democracy and with a gold plated free press’. (Howard 2000). It is noteworthy then, that it was not until 1988, eight-seven years after Federation and the creation of a national political press corps, that a scholarly analysis of the Canberra press gallery was published.