Amidst backlashes over the shocking death of Kate Middleton's nurse
after she took a prank call from 2Day FM's hosts, Southern Cross
Austereo which owns the radio station points its finger at the King
Edward VII Hospital. Sandy Kaye, a spokesperson for Austereo, believes
the hospital is responsible for Jacintha Saldanha's death.
While the hospital insisted no punishment was given to Jacintha who
transferred the hoax call to Kate's ward and led DJs Mel Greig and
Michael Christian to speak to another nurse who later gave full update
on the pregnant Duchess, the radio station urges the hospital to "do its
homework" before blaming someone else.
The representative says in a statement, "No one has looked at the
hospital; it is quite easy to blame us. The hospital were very quick to
get their statement out. It is much sexier to attack an Australian radio
network without having done your homework to find out how much
responsibility we actually bear."
"I don't want to shift the blame. It [the prank call] is much sexier
than the issue of depression or talking about what led someone to a
suicide ... The Australian industry seems to sit quite fairly behind us.
It was only supposed to be a harmless prank."
Mel and Michael pretended to be Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles when
making the call to the hospital. The conversation with the hospital
staff was later broadcast on air, and the two Australian presenters
bragged about it on their social media, which were quickly shut down
after news broke out that one of the nurses was found dead in a reported
suicide.
Lord Glenarthur, the chairman of the hospital, condemned the hoax call
as "extremely foolish" and suggested that the "ill-considered actions"
led to the "humiliation" of Jacintha and the other nurse. "I appreciate
that you cannot undo the damage which has been done but I would urge you
to take steps to ensure that such an incident could never be repeated,"
he wrote to the radio station.
Max Moore-Wilton, the chief of the company, replied, "I can assure you
we are taking immediate action and reviewing the broadcast and processes
involved." While expressing their condolence, the executive argued that
the outcome of the prank call was "unforeseeable." The hosts were
suspended until further notice.
The radio station itself has history of backfiring stunts. One of their
presenters once came under fire for making a 14-year-old girl confess in
a similar on-air prank involving her own mother that she was raped when
she was 12. The same DJ was also reprimanded for calling a female
journalist a "fat sl*g" in response to her report on the low ratings of
his radio show.
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