Monday 28 November 2022 01:26 PM Ita Buttrose tells Australian Story how she soared to the top of Australian ... trends now
Publishing icon Ita Buttrose has spoken about her storied career and the Australian media landscape she helped to shape and declared at 80: 'There's more I want to achieve'.
Buttrose appeared on Australian Story on Monday reminiscing about her six decades at the forefront of journalism, which has seen her most recently step into the role of chair of the ABC.
She took on the job with the national broadcaster as a 'captain's pick' by former Prime Minister Scott Morrison - her name not having even been on the shortlist of suggested candidates - but almost immediately found herself in a showdown with Australian Federal Police.
ABC headquarters in Sydney were raided in June 2019 over the broadcaster's Afghan Files reports two years earlier, which detailed allegations of war crimes by the nation's elite special forces.
Ita Buttrose (pictured) is currently the chair of the national broadcaster
The AFP was investigating if the reports constituted a threat to national security - even going so far to request journalists involved be fingerprinted - a move which many viewed as an attempt to intimidate the ABC.
'I was shocked,' Buttrose told the program.
'What sort of a country are we where we send the federal police in to threaten and frighten the national broadcaster.'
Buttrose, then well into her 70s, didn't back down, resolutely pushing back by challenging the raid in the federal court.
'I know how important freedom of the press is and I will defend it to the utmost,' she said at the time.
While the court challenge was unsuccessful the validity of the raids sparked an ongoing debate, two parliamentary inquiries and a series of Ministerial Directives.
When Buttrose took the reigns of the ABC, the public broadcaster was at its 'lowest ebb'.
She took on the man's world of magazine and newspaper publishing in her early career (pictured)
The former managing director and chair has been removed months earlier in controversial circumstances and the ABC's independence was increasingly
