There’s a nickname for the man who runs ABC radio these days. Some jokingly call him a Black Thunder bro – a nod to the time when Ben Latimer, now the director of audio at our national broadcaster, worked at commercial radio stations. Those Black Thunders (SUVs) were all over Sydney, handing out Coke and chips.

Is that unfair? Since he took over, ABC local radio has lingered in the doldrums. We need neither Coke nor chips nor the kind of staccato delivery which has come to personify the sound of ABC Sydney. Blokes barking at me. Reminds me of work. Geez, those booming low voices are triggering.

Broadcasters Chris Bath, left, and Sarah Macdonald, and the man at the helm of ABC radio, Ben Latimer. Credit: ABC, James Brickwood, Supplied

We are a day after the release of disappointing radio ratings and two days after we heard Chris Bath chose to leave the crucial Drive slot. She won’t have even reached a year in the gig. Is it resourcing? God knows but when I ask some staffers if they are getting the kind of money needed to do local radio well, they laugh at me. Unkind.

Some of the folks still at the ABC tell me it’s hard to get a clear message through to Latimer. As a leader, he is steeped in commercial radio, the sound of it. Commercial radio........

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