By Madeleine Heffernan and Matt Wade
Celebrity surgeon Munjed Al Muderis has had a shocker of a fortnight after comprehensively losing his defamation battle against The Age, Sydney Morning Herald and 60 Minutes.
In a landmark judgment, Justice Wendy Abraham found Al Muderis was dishonest, callous and prioritised fame, money and numbers above vulnerable patients.
She also found the “positive media his practice had enjoyed needed correcting, and the [media organisations’] investigation revealed another side of his practice. Patients should be making their decisions with both sides of the story.”
TV host Anh Do with surgeon Munjed Al Muderis on season three of Anh’s Brush with Fame.Credit: ABC iview
Yet over at the ABC, both sides of the story are nowhere to be found.
Media monitoring shows the national broadcaster has virtually ignored the verdict of the year’s biggest defamation case. Reporting on the landmark verdict cannot be found on its website, beyond a lengthy segment on the Law Report, which notes the case was the first time a media organisation had successfully defended a defamation case on public interest grounds.
Al Muderis (portrait by Anh Do) and the victims who led to his court defeat.Credit: Michael Howard
And on Thursday afternoon, the ABC decided to broadcast a rerun of Anh’s Brush with Fame featuring – you guessed it – Al Muderis.
On the long-running show, comedian and author Anh Do interviews “extraordinary Australians” while painting their portrait. The episode with Al Muderis ran in the third season of the six-season show, and ends with Do saying: “I look forward to seeing what else he has next in store for us.”
CBD contacted the ABC to ask why the episode went to air given the court finding that “positive media coverage his practice had enjoyed needed correcting”, whether the episode would remain on its catch-up service iview, and questions about how the national broadcaster had covered the landmark ruling.
“The episode of Anh’s Brush with Fame featuring Munjed Al Muderis was made in 2018,” an ABC spokesperson said on Thursday evening.
“In light of the Federal Court’s recent judgment, the ABC has taken the decision to remove the episode from ABC iview and the broadcast rotation.”
Biles flies with the Hawks
It’s an Australian tradition that visiting celebrities are forced to choose an AFL team and pose in their footy jumper.
Richmond once claimed Indian cricketer Virat Kohli, while British singer Robbie Williams ended up with Carlton (and the key to Melbourne). Hollywood A-lister Jeff Goldblum was once photographed at an NRL game wearing a Rabbitohs cap.
Now, celebrated gymnast Simone Biles has joined prime minister Anthony Albanese, swimmer Ariarne Titmus and former Victorian premier Jeff Kennett as a Hawk.
Biles has won a record 11 Olympic medals. So why was arguably the greatest gymnast of all time (height 1.42 metres) posing in Twins-style pics with 1.91-metre-tall Hawthorn star Will Day and a personalised brown and yellow jumper?
Gymnast Simone Biles and Hawthorn player Will Day.Credit: Facebook
Biles is visiting Australia for the self-described “property industry event of 2025”, REA Group’s Ready25 event in Sydney’s Royal Randwick.
A Hawthorn rep tells CBD that Day was invited to the conference and presented Biles with the Hawks’ 2025 Indigenous guernsey. Asked if Biles was a fan, a club spokesman said he would “let the photo do the talking”.
Real estate is one of the few industries that can afford to bring out celebrities to talk wellbeing, authenticity and other buzzwords. Former US vice president and presidential candidate Kamala Harris recently shot the breeze at a real estate conference on the Gold Coast.
Golden ticket
It’s been dubbed Canberra Coachella; for three days a curious assortment of boffins, bureaucrats, business leaders and cabinet ministers have crammed the Parliament House Cabinet Room for the Economic Reform Roundtable.
Sadly, journalists weren’t welcome at the talkfest but, judging from the leaks, some interactions were predictable. Participants reported host and federal Treasurer Jim Chalmers had a “fiery exchange” with his shadow, Ted O’Brien, over budget policy. Chalmers apparently accused O’Brien of acting like it was parliamentary question time.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers speaks during day three of the Economic Reform Roundtable meeting at Parliament House.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Finance Minister Katy Gallagher, who was in the room at the time, played down the tiff by telling the ABC “we are pretty used to the hustle and bustle and to and fro of politics. It was just an interaction like that.”
But such a tedious political interruption does remind CBD of the legendary scene from the movie Billy Madison when a school principal tells a student played by Adam Sandler that “everyone in this room is now dumber” for listening to him.
Regardless of any policy outcomes, the roundtable has been a first-rate networking opportunity. Among the invitees were Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock, tech billionaire Scott Farquhar and Commonwealth Bank boss Matt Comyn.
But our favourite participant was independent economist Chris Richardson, who added some colour to the deliberations on productivity, regulatory reform and budget sustainability. When Richardson first received a coveted invitation to the roundtable, he compared it to one of the golden tickets to Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory.
He then posted a photo on his way to Canberra – from a Murrays bus – and reframed the roundtable as Canberra Glastonbury rather than Coachella because “it’s cold, wet and muddy, and a few of the stars on stage are ageing (like me)“. Richardson even let us in on his roundtable playlist for the bus trip, including Spandau Ballet’s Gold, while reading Productivity Commission reports.
We haven’t heard whether any other round-tablers, say Bullock, Farquhar or Comyn, caught the bus.
Move over NIMBY and YIMBY
Move over “skibidi toilet”, “delulu”, “trad wife” and the other new words added to this year’s Cambridge Dictionary.
When it comes to housing, we’ve all heard of NIMBYs (not in my backyard) and their nemesis, YIMBYs (yes in my backyard).
TIMBY (thoughtfully in my backyard) is the new acronym in housing-obsessed Australia. Credit: Michael Mucci
Now there’s another housing-based acronym on the block. It’s “TIMBYs”, and it stands for “thoughtfully in my backyard”. TIMBY is being promoted by the good people of the National Trust of Australia’s Victorian branch and the Royal Historical Society of Victoria.
They say TIMBY is a “balanced, inclusive approach that delivers more housing while respecting heritage, character, and community values”. This all sounds very sensible.
And for the young people playing along at home, backyards are green places at the rear of housing that could be purchased for peanuts decades ago.
Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.