Laurie Oakes
| Laurie Oakes | |
|---|---|
Oakes in 2014
|
|
| Born |
14 August 1943 Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia |
| Occupation | journalist, author |
Laurie Oakes (born 14 August 1943 in Newcastle, New South Wales) is an Australian political journalist and media commentator. Since 1966, he has worked in the Canberra Press Gallery, covering the Parliament of Australia and federal elections.
Oakes was educated at Lithgow High School and graduated in 1964 from the University of Sydney while working part-time with the Sydney Daily Mirror.
At the age of 25 he was the Melbourne Sun's Canberra Bureau Chief and while working for that paper he began providing political commentaries for the TV program, Willesee at Seven. In 1978 he began The Laurie Oakes Report, a televised political journal. In 1979 he joined Network Ten and worked there for five years. He has since written about politics for The Age in Melbourne and the Sunday Telegraph in Sydney. He commentates for several radio stations.
In 1980 he obtained a draft copy of the Australian federal budget, before it was tabled in Parliament.
In 1997, Oakes used leaked documents to report on abuse of parliamentary travel expenses, which ended the careers of three ministers, several other politicians and some of their staff. More recently he used leaked documents showing the Rudd Government ignored warnings from four key departments about its Fuelwatch scheme.
Oakes has been a weekly contributor to various Publishing and Broadcasting Limited (PBL) owned media outlets, including the former Channel 9 television program, Sunday. He has also been a regular reporter for Nine News. He wrote a weekly column for The Bulletin magazine until it ceased publication in January, 2008. Oakes now writes for Sydney's The Saturday Daily Telegraph. He now presents politics for Weekend Today with hosts Cameron Williams and Leila McKinnon.
...
Wikipedia