“The ACTU is an important organisation. A speech to the ACTU delivered by the alternative prime minister is an important event. The exclusion of journalists trying to do their job should not have happened and it shouldn’t happen ever again.” Several industrial relations reporters including those representing Fairfax Media had been excluded after travelling from interstate to report on the congress. ALP president Wayne Swan was repeatedly asked about why journalists were locked out of the dinner during a press conference at the ACTU congress on Wednesday. The first time he was asked, he said: "I'm not aware of those arrangements". Asked how he "felt" about the journalists being locked out, he said: "I back my leader all the way."

When a reporter asked a third question "just to be clear, you're okay with the media being locked out of the dinner and a lack of transparency", Mr Swan said he did not accept the premise of the question. "I support my leader," he said. "They were locked out," the journalist persisted, before Mr Swan left the press conference. Senior Labor frontbencher Athony Albanese was also asked why the media was locked out of Bill Shorten’s speech. "I have no idea," Mr Albanese said. The journalist replied, "Okay, I guess – still on that, what was the Opposition Leader hiding? Is there anything you can say about that?"

Mr Albanese then said the decision, with regard to media, would have been made by the ACTU. "And the ACTU obviously have made a decision that some of their conference is open to the media and some of it is not. That's a decision for them that they're entitled to make," he said. "So you don’t think that was Bill Shorten’s decision?," the journalist persisted. "It would have been a decision of the ACTU. My understanding is that some of the ACTU congress is open to the media and some of it is not. I don't see it as a big deal. I know that Bill Shorten’s speech has been distributed to the media and to the public because I've read it. In return, the journalist asked: "Do you think this is the way Bill Shorten would conduct himself if he was Prime Minister, locking the media out of speeches?"

Mr Albanese replied: "Bill Shorten didn’t do anything. What happened was that the ACTU made a decision. Bill Shorten does press conferences each and every day. And I think that is obvious that is the case and he's certainly accountable through the media." A spokeswoman for the ACTU said: “The Congress dinner was a private ticketed event for delegates and was not open to the media.” Steve Knott from the Australian Resources and Energy Group posted this message on Twitter: "Note to IR comrades from the fourth estate: You are always welcome at AMMA dinners + they are far more informative + much more fun".