The 7.30 Report (1986 - current)
Current affairs program
Daily x 30 minutes
Series synopsis:
A national prime time news and current affairs television program, presented by Kerry O’Brien, offering in-depth coverage and analysis of the major daily news events both domestic and international. Each edition has up to four stories, of five to seven minutes duration, ranging across politics, the environment and economics as well as medical, social, sporting and cultural issues. The program has a network of correspondents in every State and Territory and access to the ABC’s foreign correspondents. The week often concludes with Brian Dawes interviewing John Clarke as this comedy duo offer their satirical take on an issue of the week.
Curator’s Notes:
When The 7.30 Report began in 1986 it was a State-based program. Then in 1996 it became national, with Kerry O’Brien as compere. Past presenters of the State programs include Quentin Dempster, Andrew Olle, Trisha Goddard, Sarah Henderson, Mary Delahunty and Genevieve Hussey. It began after the demise of The National, an experiment that combined ABC’s evening news bulletin with current affairs in a one-hour program beginning at 6.30pm. The 7.30 Report follows directly after the ABC’s 7pm National News broadcast and is screened Monday to Friday.
The 7.30 Report usually includes an extended political interview conducted by Kerry O’Brien with the powerbrokers of the day. O’Brien is one of the most prominent and respected names in Australian journalism. His many awards include the much-coveted Gold Walkley. He was a senior reporter on This Day Tonight (the ABC’s original nightly current affairs program at 7.30pm which ran from 1968 to 1978), he has been a reporter for Four Corners and spent three years as a press secretary, first for Gough Whitlam and, after Labor lost power in 1975, for Labor Deputy Leader Lionel Bowen. Before becoming the presenter of The 7.30 Report in 1996, he compered the highly-respected Lateline program.
The sister program to The 7.30 Report is Stateline, covering local affairs, which is broadcast from each State and Territory on Fridays at 7.30pm.
Titles in this series
The 7.30 Report – Boys Education 2005
A current affairs program beginning and ending with death. The program covers the death of Pope John Paul II as well as the return of the bodies of the nine dead Australian servicemen killed when their helicopter crashed whilst on ...
The 7.30 Report - Orchestra Tunes In 2005
This edition of The 7.30 Report begins with an update from the ABC’s Indonesia correspondent, Tim Palmer, reporting from Aceh where he’s been on many occasions since the tsunami struck on Boxing Day 2004. This is followed by a story ...
The 7.30 Report – Pneumococcal Vaccine 2003
This is a good example of an effective 7.30 Report episode. The program begins with a news story from Iraq where seven weeks after the invasion, there are still no signs of the weapons of mass destruction. This is followed ...
The 7.30 Report – Tobacco Litigation 2003
This edition of the ABC’s prime-time current affairs program begins with an update on the war in Iraq where the two sons of former dictator Saddam Hussein have been killed, and concludes with the largely unknown story of the surrealist ...
