Gina Rinehart last night joined the ranks of Australia's media barons after becoming the biggest shareholder in Fairfax Media.
Mrs Rinehart, Australia's richest person thanks to her enormous iron ore fortune in the Pilbara, has secured a 12.6 per cent stake in Fairfax after an audacious mid-week raid on the media company's stock.
Her private company, Hancock Prospecting, also owns 10 per cent of the Ten Network.
With an estimated $18.5billion fortune, Mrs Rinehart is now expected to join the board of Fairfax, owner of the The Canberra Times, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, The Australian Financial Review and radio station 3AW.
Ten Network chairman Brian Long has rejected suggestions the billionaire interfered in editorial content or programming decisions.
He moved yesterday to quash reports that recent media purchases by Mrs Rinehart in Ten and Fairfax Media, were motivated by a desire to gain editorial influence.
''Much of the comment is about the presumed motivation of Gina influencing the editorial content at Fairfax ... what worries me is almost every article makes the implied or explicit suggestion that her investment in Ten was motived by the same thing, to influence editorial content to suit her needs,'' he said.
''I want to make it clear that in all the time I have been chairman - which is as long as Gina Rinehart has been on the board - that neither she or any other board member has sought to influence programming or editorial.
''That goes for either inside the boardroom or outside the boardroom.''
Mr Long said no discussion of the proposed Mining Resources Rent Tax - of which Mrs Rinehart has been a vocal opponent - had taken place at board level at Ten. He also said Mrs Rinehart had played no role in the hiring of conservative newspaper columnist Andrew Bolt.
''Andrew was on our payroll prior to Mrs Rinehart joining the board. The news and editorial teams were the ones who framed Andrew into the Sunday show,'' he said.
Mr Long has been chairman of Network Ten since December 2010, the same time James Packer, Lachlan Murdoch, Mrs Rinehart and Paul Mallam joined the board.
Mr Mallam is the nominee of billionaire media baron Bruce Gordon, who controls the WIN network.
Mr Long has a long association with the Packer family, having worked as an auditor for the private PBL group and advised the late Kerry Packer on a number of deals.
''I have a long history working in the media world and I can only recall once incident when a proprietor interfered directly in programming,'' Mr Long said. ''That's when Kerry rang Nine and had Doug Mulray's show pulled off air midstream. I have no doubt that's true. He would have done it because he found the show offensive. But on news, on current affairs, editorially, I have never seen a thing happen like that.''
The show was Australia's Naughtiest Home Videos, which lasted half an episode in September 1992.
Rumours have swirled through the corporate world of a conflict between James Packer - who has since left the Ten board - and Mrs Rinehart. ''Absolutely not true. I have no idea where that notion has come from.''
Despite her mining background, Mr Long said Mrs Rinehart was an ''experienced'' addition to the Ten board.
''When Gina was elected by shareholders she stood up and explained what she had to bring to the boardroom table. I introduced her at that meeting as Australia's most successful businesswoman.
''She brings to the table the benefit of her experience and her strategic thinking.
''We don't look for a board to be a group of people to be have identical experience in the industry.
''We want broad experience and debate, she brings that.''
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