Incoming ABC boss, Michelle Guthrie, has pledged to protect the tradition of editorial independence at the national broadcaster but the former Google executive has also left the door open to non-traditional developments like advertising and digital paywalls.

Ms Guthrie, who will be paid $900,000 a year to steer the ABC as its first female managing director, received a traditional welcome by the conservative flank of the Liberal Party, with dumped minister Eric Abetz​ urging the new boss to "stop the lefty love-in".

"The new managing director will inherit an unbalanced and largely-centralised public broadcaster which has become a protection racket for the left ideology," said Senator Abetz said in a press release issued an hour before the ABC's announcement of Ms Guthrie's appointment on Monday.

In her first interview on ABC 24, Ms Guthrie said there was an "important distinction" between the ABC's role as an "independent public broadcaster rather than a state broadcaster".