David Wilson
The Age
“David was cunning, defiant, mischievous, suspicious of authority and very smart.”
David Wilson led The Age’s Insight investigative team for a decade and was one of the first journalists in Australia to build vast databases of information that enabled him to expose dozens of criminals and organised crime figures.
Wilson helped reveal corrupt land deals in Victoria in 1970s and early 1980s, claiming the scalps of two state ministers and jail for a senior official. A series known as The Age Tapes in 1984 led to a controversial political-judicial crisis that reverberated for years, embroiling a High Court judge and sparking numerous inquiries including a Royal Commission.
Career Timeline
1950 -1969: Born in Pascoe Vale South in Melbourne, attends Brunswick Street Primary School, then Brighton Grammar where he excels in cricket, making the school’s top 50 cricketers of the century and plays at District level.
1969: Joins The Age as a cadet journalist and bridles at being asked to do the menial tasks usually assigned to cub reporters. His news editor grounds the cocky upstart on a radio news desk and reads him the riot act, but sees something special: “David was like a colt who would kick and bite, but you always knew he was going to gallop for you.”
1970 – 1980: Works through local beats including police, courts and politics before being appointed Urban Affairs Reporter during a development boom. He makes an extraordinary list of contacts in politics, police, bureaucracy and business. Wilson’s news-breaking reputation is created as he uncovers dodgy transactions in a property market controlled by unelected and unaccountable officials.
1981: The Age sends Wilson to finishing school, working with the Sunday Times Insight team in London, the model used for The Age’s investigative unit.
1982: Wilson returns to Melbourne and joins Ben Hills and others on Insight at The Age. His real estate contacts help Insight uncover dodgy land transactions, corrupt agents and bribery of public officials. The scandal eventually leads to the sacking of two State Ministers and the demise of the Hamer-Thompson government in Victoria.
1984: Wilson is appointed head of the Insight team. Sydney crime reporter Bob Bottom brings Insight copious illegal NSW police tapes and transcripts of conversations between corrupt solicitors, magistrates, racing identities, and High Court judge Lionel Murphy. Wilson’s analytical skills and growing understanding of media law pave the way for a blockbuster series that exposes a web of influence among criminals and the justice system. Murphy is found guilty of perverting the course of justice, but acquitted on appeal. The Age Tapes series causes a political furore, extreme pressure on The Age and accusations that they were fake. A Royal Commission confirms their authenticity and the tapes lead to the prosecution of dozens of criminals, new organised crime laws and a standing Crime Commission. Wilson and his colleagues could have won journalism’s grandest prizes for their work, but Wilson insisted that his editor Creighton Burns be nominated for the Graham Perkin Australian Journalist of the Year award for courage in publishing the tapes stories and leadership in fighting the political and legal attacks that followed the publication. Burns wins.
1984-1989: The Age’s assistant editor Michael Smith takes Wilson to the annual conference of the US Investigative Reporters and Editors group in Phoenix where they learn the emerging art of computer-assisted reporting. The tools enabled The Age to establish a ground-breaking approach to electronic data-matching that helped expose dozens of criminals in the next 10 years. Then followed a steady stream of investigations that exposed some of Australia’s biggest organised crime figures. Wilson and his team procure highly sensitive files from law enforcement agencies, royal commissions and government departments. Federal police conduct raids to investigate the leaks. Insight gets historical and sensitive police Special Branch surveillance files that were ordered to be destroyed decades earlier because of civil liberties concerns; The Age delivers them to the Police Commissioner on the day of publication. The Insight files help many other young reporters get stories into a publishable form; Wilson insists on leaving his name off these stories. Wilson receives two serious threats from organised crime figures. He is made an Associate Editor of The Age in 1987.
1989-93: The Age and the rest of the Fairfax group are put into receivership after a disastrous privatisation attempt by Warwick Fairfax. Wilson becomes chair of The Age Independence Committee with a mission to force prospective buyers to sign a charter of editorial independence. The committee gets huge support from readers and thousands attend a rally in Treasury Gardens in Melbourne. On stage at the rally, Wilson brings together fierce political foes Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser to share a platform for the first time since the Dismissal in 1975. Wilson’s negotiating skills persuade interventionist new proprietor Conrad Black to sign the charter. The charter becomes a model for the rest of the Fairfax group and other media outlets.
1993-97: Wilson continues his investigative work, winning a Walkley and is runner up in the Graham Perkin Australian Journalist of the Year Award.
1998: Wilson resigns from The Age and joins his former editor Michael Smith at global public relations company IPR Shandwick, where Smith is Australian chairman. In 2000, they form their own company, Inside Public Relations, focussing on crisis management and litigation PR. They feed many scoops to investigative reporters.
2008: Wilson dies suddenly from post-operative surgery after a short illness.
2012: Wilnic, a family trust established by Wilson’s wife, Josephine Nicholls, sponsors the Melbourne Press Club’s annual Young Journalist of the Year Award; the main prize is a trip to the annual conference of the Investigative Reporters and Editors group. It is a perfect match given Wilson’s history of mentoring young journalists and his links to the IRE.
2019: The Melbourne Press Club moves to replace Wilnic’s sponsorship with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, despite a “fee-for-no-service" scandal and other serious regulatory compliance issues. The CBA then declines the sponsorship after publicity about the club’s proposal to dump Wilnic in its favour. Wilnic becomes a donor to Democracy’s Watchdogs.
Books
Big Shots: A Who’s Who in Australian Crime (with Lindsay Murdoch), Sun Books, 1985.
Big Shots II: (with Paul Robinson), Sun Books, 1987.
Awards
1997: Runner-up, Graham Perkin Australian Journalist of the Year, for a portfolio of investigative reports on organised crime.
1997: Walkley Award for Sports Reporting (with Patrick Smith) for reports on abnormally high bicarbonate readings in a horse handled by Melbourne’s top trainer.