ABC Friends has been out and about all over Victoria this past week raising awareness about how much the national broadcaster needs your vote this election.

We are scoring candidates who agree to reinvest in the ABC to guarantee that the ABC remains free and accessible to all Australians.

Since the writs were issued last Monday for a federal election on Saturday 3 May our first task has been to urge young people to register to vote, to make their vote count.

We are also seeking responses to the ABCF platform from all candidates and political parties before Easter so we will have score cards ready for early voting and pre-polling.

We are handing out flyers, advertising on social media and attending public events, encouraging people to vote for candidates who support the ABC. There is a lot to be done to get the message out to voters.

The National ABCF election campaign website is up and running at https://www.votefearlessabc.au/

It has all the information you need about our election platform, social media posts and videos. You can sign up to receive regular e-news bulletins and volunteer to be part of the campaign.

Here in Victoria our social media campaign will focus on six key seats in regional and urban areas where your vote could make the difference between a candidate who supports additional funding to ensure that high quality ABC services can be received by all Australians, and a candidate who doesn’t understand that our democracy depends on a strong ABC and is not interested in protecting the ABC’s independence.

In his recent address to the Melbourne Press Club, ABC Chairman Kim Williams AM reminded us all that it’s becoming clear that democracies need to talk, urgently, about how to maintain and protect a free media.

“You simply can’t defend your freedom without defending media freedom. I have an allergy to slogans however in this case, it is a simple as that – no freedom without the media freedom,” Mr Williams said. “For media freedom, we must maintain strong journalistic standards and find ways to keep our media industry economically viable.”

He said he wants to hold ABC journalism to account as having defendable values as to reliable performance consistent with the standards set out in the ABC Act, and: to ensure that the gathering and presentation by the Corporation of news and information is accurate and impartial according to the recognised standards of objective journalism.

Mr Williams said that as a result of last year’s funding base increase the Government has now effectively reversed the impact of the indexation pause that the ABC was subject to between 2019 and 2022. “We truly appreciate the stabilisation of ABC funding after years of decline,” he said. “But the ABC’s funding level remains extremely low by historical standards. In real terms it is more than $150m per annum less than it was in 2013. In the Year 2000, funding for the ABC comprised 0.31% of Commonwealth outlays. Today that is around 0.12%, and we are called upon to do much more with it.”

Polling has also shown that ABC services are not only used, but importantly audiences also said that they relied on them. The research found that the ABC had the most relied on news outlets on free-to-air TV, on catch-up or streaming, on radio, and for online news.

More than 80,000 ABC Friends and supporters right across the country are on the move to make sure all voters are fully informed about the choices they are making in this forthcoming election.

There is a lot of information available so you can make an informed choice in support of candidates who support the ABC.

Carol Stuart

National Vice-President