The Newcastle Herald has apologised for publishing a front page ad from Clive Palmer’s new Trumpet of Patriots party which says “there are only two genders”, as journalists at the Age say they are “furious” the Melbourne newspaper has apparently accepted the same ad for publication.
In the past week the Age has published Palmer’s anti-immigration and anti-welcome to country advertisements, which have also appeared in News Corp publications.
On Friday the front page of the Age carried an ad that read: “We don’t need to be welcomed to our own country.”
On Tuesday the front page ad said: “Too much immigration destroys infrastructure.”
The publisher of the Newcastle Herald, Australian Community Media, removed the ad from its digital edition on Tuesday and apologised, telling readers the ad did not meet its values as a company.
“ACM and the Herald apologise unreservedly to our readers, the transgender community and to the Newcastle community more broadly for any hurt and distress caused by the publication of the advertisement,” the company said.
Separately, journalists from the Age, published by Nine Entertainment, wrote a formal letter of complaint to management after discovering the same ad was slated to be published on the front page of the Age on Wednesday.
Sources told Guardian Australia accepting the ad for publication was a “slap in the face” for staff and readers, and did not align with the newspaper’s editorial stance on marriage equality.
The editor of the Age, Patrick Elligett, declined to comment.
The Sydney Morning Herald, also published by Nine, is not running the ad, Guardian Australia understands.
The Newcastle Herald apology came after staff wrote to management saying the ad was “an insult to the work that we do, and to the sources and readers we represent”.
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“The decision to publish an advertisement that does not reflect our commitment to journalistic integrity, our standards of publication, the diversity of the community, or the values that we profess to uphold is repellent to us and is clearly represented by the inundation of rightful complaints that staff have been dealing with this morning,” the letter, seen by Guardian Australia, said.
The ad placed by Trumpet of Patriots says: “We must stop confusing children in schools. Give them a safe and normal environment to grow and develop in and let them decide who they are when they become adults.”
Palmer spent close to $100m campaigning before the 2022 federal election and took out a huge amount of advertising in the same trademark yellow, but his United Australia party’s primary vote was only 4.7% across the country.
ACM said in its statement it had checks in place for political advertising “but on this occasion the process failed and the advertisement was not reviewed before publication”.
In 2021 Nine rejected ads from Palmer that it considered contravened government issued-health advice on vaccines, but accepted anti-lockdown ads.