When all your conversations on and off air are recorded it’s impossible to deny what was said. But in The Kyle and Jackie O Show’s multimillion-dollar legal dispute the warring parties are arguing about when those heated exchanges before a hot mic were bullying and when they were content. Content for which the radio station paid its stars a hefty $20m a year.
In fresh documents filed in the federal court it’s revealed that when Kyle Sandilands walked out after a fight with Jackie “O” Henderson in 2023 she said “people would tune in for” a podcast on the fight and it would “probably get our highest ratings”. A podcast was produced and given the catchy title “Kyle & Jackie’s unheard EXPLOSIVE off air fight”.
“Yesterday’s show ended quite abruptly when Kyle left,” it said. “It all seemed quite heated but Jackie has cleared the air with what really happened. Have a listen for all the details.”
In March Sandilands was sacked by ARN Media and the top-rating show was cancelled, sparking a wave of legal claims from all parties.
Backed up by multiple examples of heated exchanges Sandilands has asserted that the conduct his former bosses now say was “serious misconduct” and warranted his sacking was “publicly exploited”. He said Kiis FM management had “sought to monetise the conduct” and had given him the impression his conversations with Henderson were “not unacceptable”.
Similarly, when Henderson disparaged Sandilands for taking sick days, the behaviour was “encouraged”, Sandilands said in defence documents to the company’s cross-claim. This led the shock jock to assume the “conduct was not unacceptable”.
The documents detail episodes when the pair used ChatGPT as a therapist, with Henderson asking: “How do I tell my colleague that I get annoyed when he always calls in sick?” She also told it: “This is bullshit. Don’t listen to him. He’s a liar. That’s my truth. How do I tell my colleague all he does is exaggerate and lie? He’s a gaslighter. Is my truth not important?”
Sandilands asserted these comments had been replayed on the program three times in 2025.
Justice Angus Stewart has set a date for a 10-day trial in October.
Writers duke it out
An error in the Weekend Australian and a response in the literary magazine Overland have provided observers with plenty of entertainment all week as the two writers duked it out in the comments.
It started with a lengthy piece in the Murdoch broadsheet headed “How the media went from newsroom watchdogs to activist brands” by Michael Gawenda. The former editor of the Age was angry with the way journalists have covered antisemitism and he ranted about “ethical standards” and “editorial standards”.
He repeated his regular complaint that the Age has refused to publish him since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October: “Not a single piece by me has been published since October 7 2023.”
The Australian, which publishes him regularly these days, is “pretty good”, he said.
“In my view, The Australian’s coverage of these issues – I mean in particular how the rise in Jew-hatred had affected the lives of Australian Jews and threatened Australian multiculturalism – has been pretty good.”
Gawenda took a swipe along the way at the ABC Media Watch host, Linton Besser, for his coverage of the issue, the ABC Americas editor, John Lyons, and the author and University of Melbourne academic Jeff Sparrow.
It was when he came to Sparrow that Gawenda, 79, came a cropper.
“The journalists who signed [a letter about reporting on the war in Gaza] were, in the main, the product of university journalism courses in which they were instructed by academics such as the aforementioned Sparrow, the editor of Overland magazine,” Gawenda said.
“Days after the October 7 attacks, Sparrow organised and published the now-infamous letter signed by hundreds of writers that urged the massacre by Hamas of 1200 Israelis to be seen as an act of ‘resistance’.”
Unfortunately for Gawenda, Sparrow was not the editor of Overland, and he neither organised nor published the letter. He did, however, sign it.
Sparrow wrote a response in Overland which was widely shared: “Had Gawenda performed actual journalism rather than simply reminiscing about it, he would have discovered the not insignificant fact that I ceased editing Overland back in 2014 …
“I neither organised nor published Overland’s open letter, which had precisely zero relationship with the University of Melbourne. Gawenda’s key anecdote rests on a complete falsehood, one that even a cursory Google search would have debunked.”
Gawenda jumped into the comments section on Overland and doubled down, blaming the publication for an old web page which said Sparrow was the editor. “Anyway, Sparrow signed the letter and I believe, from people I know, that he talked to writers to urge them to sign it,” he wrote.
Late Thursday, days after Sparrow asked for a correction and an apology, The Australian’s article was partially corrected. The first mention now has Sparrow as “a former editor of Overland” but the second still has him as “the editor of Overland magazine”. There is no editor’s note to acknowledge the changes.
Sparrow told Weekly Beast: “Nothing says journalistic ethics like surreptitiously correcting falsehoods without telling your readers – and nothing says journalistic quality like bungling your surreptitious correction.”
The editor-in-chief of the Australian, Michelle Gunn, was approached for comment.
Off target
An article on the ABC News site on Wednesday had a dramatic headline: “More than 8 million people rely on income support, driven by a growing number of mental health claims.”
According to Services Australia, the term “income support” refers to regular safety net payments – in other words, welfare payments. That would mean almost 30% of Australians are receiving welfare payments.
When you got into the story you discover that “income support” refers to sick leave from an employer.
The “vast majority – about 7.5 million – are accessing more employer provided sick leave, typically for short periods of around three weeks, rather than government welfare payments such as JobSeeker or the disability support pension”, the article said.
The story was based on a press release from the Council of Australian Life Insurers, which represents life insurance and income protection providers.
After it was published a rider was added acknowledging the source: “CALI – whose members have a direct commercial interest in reducing long‑term income protection claims – argues earlier intervention is critical.”
The article was criticised by many, including the welfare advocate Tom Studans, who said the ABC had “uncritically published industry lobby misinformation without any independent expert assessment, which has been reposted by right-wing agitators to promote anti-welfare rhetoric”.
The Queensland Greens senator Penny Allman-Payne said on X the story was “being weaponised to demonise people on welfare and undermine the social safety net. It’s a dangerous headline and the ABC needs to fix it.”
We can’t disagree with that. The ABC belatedly added the words “including sick leave” to the headline; and an editor’s note says: “The article was updated to further emphasise that income support includes sick leave.”
It may not be the end of the matter.