Ita Buttrose has revealed her views on immigration while on a book tour for her memoir Unapologetically Ita. Buttrose stepped down as chair in March 2024.

“I think we’re more divided,” the former chair of the ABC said during an online interview with Prof Henry Brodaty from the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing. “I don’t think the multicultural society that that we’ve spoken about so proudly in Australia is working as well as it could be.

“And that’s because we’ve allowed divisive groups to come into Australia, but, and that’s fine. I mean, we need all points of view, but this is Australia, so I think we have to be emphatic that you try and live our way, not the way you did when you were in the country that you left to become an Australian, because most people that do come here do end up taking out citizenship.”

Elsewhere in the chat, the 83-year-old former media executive said she was proud of the fact that no one had ever known what her politics were.

Back in 2015 when Anthony Albanese was a shadow minister, he sat down with comedian Tom Gleeson for a memorable interview on a segment called Hard Chat on Charlie Pickering’s The Weekly on ABC TV.

Albo said if Gleeson was still around in a decade he would come on again. “You’ll still be here, no doubt, in a decade,” Albanese, now the prime minister, said.

Last week, Albo made good on his promise and recorded an interview with Gleeson, according to industry blog TV Tonight.

“If Tom can bring a crew to Canberra, we can try to organise one special edition of Hard Chat for those old enough to remember it,” the PM said in July.

Gleeson: “I retired the segment five years ago but I thought the first ever Hard Chat with a sitting prime minister was worth coming back for. I was worried I would be rusty but it turns out disdain for authority figures comes pretty naturally.”

The prime minister’s office confirmed the interview had been recorded and sent us the photos, with Toto on the PM’s lap, as proof.

A drama about robodebt, a miniseries about Indigenous tennis star Evonne Goolagong Cawley and a mystery starring Anna Torv as a detective investigating gender-based violence lead the ABC’s bumper crop of new shows for 2026.

Eight months into his term as ABC managing director, Hugh Marks is talking up........

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