The Nine Networks flagship current affairs programme - Sixty Minutes - lives or dies by the ratings it earns. Keeping viewers glued to it's screen is a balance of using "edgy "subject matter in a clever way and that is why its production team are paid in the higher salary bracket.
Someone obviously thought they had a viewer winner when a young Australian mother found that her Lebanese born husband had taken their two children to Beirut on a holiday - and was now using Lebanese law to justify not returning them to Australia. Lebanon is not a signatory to the Hague Conventions which offers protection in such cases.
Somehow Sixty Minutes got involved in a cloak and dagger exercise which involved a firm specialising in "snatching " such children and returning them to their aggrieved parent. It's ex-military personnel provide this commercial service - for a fee - and it seems that Sixty Minutes paid that money on the understanding that one of their film crews would be on hand to televise the event.
It was an absolute disaster. Security was breached - and the police were waiting. In the scuffle that followed the operational people and the film crew were arrested and charged with kidnapping. There was a real prospect of a substantial term to be served in a Lebanese prison and lengthy negotiations reached to government levels.
Eventually a deal was struck. In exchange for forfeiting her parental rights to her children and receiving a large sum of money for compensation, the husband dropped the charges and the Sixty Minutes television crew - and the children's mother - were released. This "deal "did not cover the operational team engaged to secure the children and they are still in prison, awaiting trial and sentencing.
With the high profile Sixty Minutes crew back in Australia a witch hunt took place in the Nine Network board room. An internal enquiry recommended "no dismissals " but it seems this advice was ignored - and producer Stephen Rice was given his marching orders. He has since engaged a high level lawyer and it looks like a very interesting appeal is in the works.
It looks like Stephen Rice is the sacrificial "scapegoat ". An operation of this magnitude involved a very large sum of money paid to the recovery team and that would not be possible without high level management approval. Clearly, this involved a law breach in another country and had the children been secured they would have been smuggled out contrary to the regular lawful customs procedure. At best, Sixty Minutes was associated with what some may construe as an "act of terrorism on a foreign shore ". Force was going to be used to subdue opposition and carry out an act contrary to the laws of the country involved.
It seems strange that we threaten prison for life for any person who knowingly leaves this country to fight for IS in the Middle East - or to fight with forces opposed to IS - and yet we are mute on this foray into Lebanon by an Australian child recovery team and an Australian television presenter and her camera crew.
More to the point, it seems that the highly paid management team at Channel Nine have ducked for cover. Stephen Rice was not legally represented because the internal enquiry promised "no dismissals " and now his job prospects have been seriously damaged. He has engaged a high profile lawyer and it is likely that the internal structure of the Nine Network may be dragged screaming - into the public arena.
This was chequebook journalism at it's worst. Stephen Rice certainly has a right to demand that those who signed off on this risky operation step out of the shadows. The matter of ethics must also come into consideration. Funding an act of violence in a foreign country to gain a ratings news story does not fit inside the standards we expect to apply in Australia.
Who and why this covert operation got the nod at high level needs justification. It will probably fall into that category euphemistically called "the streakers defence."
"It seemed like a good idea at the time "!
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