As we disembarked, and handed over our passports and paperwork, the criminal was spotted and singled out by US officials. For his crimes he was taken and held apart from the rest of the pack for the duration of the stay and escorted back to the plane when it departed. Loading The criminal was the Melbourne Herald Sun’s political reporter Gerard McManus. A little over a year earlier he had pleaded guilty to five counts of contempt in the Victorian County Court. His colleague Michael Harvey pleaded guilty on four counts. Their crime was refusing the court’s direction to name the source of a story they penned in February 2004, which outed a Howard cabinet plan to slash the benefits of returned servicemen and women and dress it up as a win for veterans and widows. Before sentencing Chief Justice Michael Rozenes chided the journalists for their defiance.

“What's been said is: 'We put our ethics above the law; we're not bound by law'," Chief Judge Rozenes said. "This is almost a badge of honour, upholding the best traditions of journalistic ethics … How can any court tolerate that?" No one is above the law but the law has long recognised there are some special relationships, like that between a lawyer and a client or a doctor and patient. Kevin Rudd steps off the prime ministerial plane in 2008. Credit:Glen McCurtayne And for more than 200 years democracies around the world have recognised the value in a vibrant media holding governments to account. That’s why protecting it is written into the First Amendment of the US Constitution: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”

No one is above the law but there are bad laws and bad applications of the law. What was the real crime of McManus and Harvey: to reveal state secrets or embarrass the government? Australia is an opaque democracy when compared with its peers like the US, UK and New Zealand. Refugee boat arrivals that were once announced in a press release have been classified secret, Freedom of Information laws have been reduced to a joke by the liberal application of exemptions, “commercial-in-confidence” covers all manner of sins and our defamation laws are designed to make lawyers rich. Loading On this unsteady base 82 pieces of legislation have been added in the name of national security since 2001, according to constitutional expert Professor George Williams. Some were essential to protect the public but, at each step, media companies and the journalists’ union warned of overreach. I was involved in a series of reports about Chinese Communist Party interference in domestic politics, which sped the introduction of foreign interference laws. I thought then and believe now they are necessary. Part of that regime was a transparency register, where those with links to foreign states are obliged to declare them.

As the laws were being drafted assurances were made they would not be used against the media. Yet among the early letters sent by the Attorney-General’s Department was one to Nine’s chief executive Hugh Marks. It pointed to a news story based on footage shot by Al Jazeera that ended the political aspirations of One Nation candidate Steve Dickson. That, the department reckoned, was reason for the network to consider adding its name to the transparency register. Michael Harvey, right, and Gerard McManus speak to the media on the steps of the County Court in 2007. Credit:Pat Scala Gerard McManus is now a media adviser in the Morrison government so there is hope that all criminals may one day be redeemed. There was some change after his conviction with the introduction of shield laws to provide greater protection to journalists and their sources. It was a small pause in a steady retreat. But I have been repeatedly reminded by bureaucrats and politicians this week that most people don’t care about the media’s gripes and the government will feel little pressure from the Right to Know Campaign that Australian media outlets launched on Monday. That might be true. Maybe we are all too comfortable here and won’t notice the erosion of liberty until it’s all too late. I hope not. A free press is an imperfect pain in the arse but the alternative is worse.