How the News Corp tabloids lifted Seven’s harrowing exclusive

October 23, 2026 — 4:00am

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7News Melbourne broke news of the harrowing attack on Helen Haines in its 6pm bulletin on Monday after she was rammed by a car outside her electorate office in Wangaratta.

The report quickly thrust the nation’s top newsrooms into action to tell their own readers, listeners and viewers of the events surrounding the independent federal MP for Indi in Victoria, who has since lost both her legs.

News Corp’s tabloids were lightning fast, getting their own version of events up across its numerous syndicated websites about 10 minutes later.

But how did they confirm the story so quickly? Reporters on the ground?

It looks like News actually cut out the middle man and lifted the report from the 7News bulletin.

Usually, what would happen when another newsroom breaks a story is you’d try to firm it up yourself before republishing it, particularly with serious events such as attacks on politicians. If you felt you really had to “churn it”, as they say in the industry, then standard practice is to acknowledge the original report, not just lift it.

On Background has analysed the copy in the piece published with no byline in the Herald Sun, The Daily Telegraph and other online editions at 6.14pm on Monday, and it includes almost all of Seven reporter Paul Dowsley’s live cross from less than 10 minutes earlier – word for word. News Corp was kind enough to write its own first two paragraphs, before lumping Dowsley’s cross in as the guts of the story.

What was the giveaway? Well, a big clue was they forgot to take out the word “Mitch” as Dowsley crossed back to 7News Melbourne’s Peter Mitchell at the end of the piece.

The story remained in that state for some time before it was rewritten later in the........

© Brisbane Times