Billionaire Kerry Stokes, who ran Seven West Media headfirst into the ground over a 30 year period by fraudulently using the company as his own cash cow, is no longer a media baron and that will have a positive impact on Australia’s media landscape.

Rupert Murdoch has always grabbed the headlines in Australia for using his media to interfere in politics, but Stokes’ hasn’t been far behind pushing out lies and propaganda, at Channel Seven and the other media assets, for his own financial benefit.

The Kerry Stokes controlled Seven West Media merged with Southern Cross Media Group in January 2026 although Kerry Stokes retained the Chairmanship until Friday the 20th of February and his former lieutenant Jeff Howard was sacked as CEO of the newly merged company on Monday the 23rd of February.

The merged company is down from 79 cents on the 1st of January to 63 cents on Friday (6/2/26), so the outlook is not great. It looks like Kerry Stokes sold Southern Cross Media Group shareholders a lemon.

Some have suggested Stokes’ jumped ship as Chairman of the merged company a week earlier than planned because he didn’t want his fingerprints on Jeff Howard’s sacking.

But Howard had to go to make sure Kerry Stokes wasn’t still pulling the strings at Seven behind the scenes.

Kerry Stokes’ son, Ryan Stokes is now a director of Southern Cross Media Group and the Stokes’ own a 20% share of the company which is down from the approximately 40% controlling shareholding they owned of Seven West Media.

But the days of Kerry Stokes running the media company with an iron fist are over.

Kerry Stokes long history of corruption at Seven

Shareholders at Seven were badly ripped off by Kerry Stokes who used Seven West Media and its money for court cases totally unrelated to any possible benefit for Seven shareholders.

A prime example is Kerry Stokes used Seven West Media shareholder’s money to pay for Ben Roberts-Smith’s defamation case against Nine Entertainment and while Roberts-Smith was a Seven employee at the time there was clearly no benefit for Seven’s shareholders.

When the media reported the scandal Kerry Stokes quickly transferred liability for Ben Roberts-Smith’s defamation case to one of Kerry Stokes’ private companies. Kerry Stokes should have been charged for fraud but never was.

When Ben Roberts-Smith lost his defamation case against Nine Entertainment they went after Stokes for costs because Roberts-Smith didn’t have the $13.5 million to pay up.

Stokes refused to pay. But the court ordered Stokes to hand over his emails, after being subpoenaed by Nine, regarding his involvement in the defamation case.

Stokes appealed the email decision and lost, so he decided to pay the full $13.5 million instead of handing over his emails.

The Ben Roberts-Smith case was one of many where Kerry Stokes used Seven’s money to try and silence people or use courts for a war of law using Seven shareholder’s money.

Kerry Stokes v The World

Probably the most infamous Stokes court case was the C7 matter which became known as “Kerry Stokes v The World” which cost Seven shareholders an estimated $200 million.

The ABC reported on the judgment in 2007:

The Seven television network has suffered an enormous blow, losing its long-running legal battle in the C7 case.

Seven had argued a number of parties, including News Corporation, Publishing and Broadcasting Limited (PBL), Foxtel had acted anti-competitively in securing the rights to broadcast sporting events.

But Justice Ronald Sackville dismissed Seven’s case on all its grounds, saying there was “more than a hint of hypocrisy” in many of Seven’s contentions.

Justice Sackville says the case is best described as “mega litigation” which has placed a very large burden on the court, and through it, the community.

“It is difficult to understand how the cost incurred by the parties can be said to be proportionate to what is truly at stake, measured in financial terms,” he said.

“In my view, the expenditure of $200 million and counting on a single piece of litigation is not only extraordinarily wasteful, but borders on the scandalous.” (Click here to read more)

Kerry Stokes, who is a billionaire, should have been made to pay the $200 million for the C7 case himself.

Bruce Lehrmann and the Channel 7 payment

Seven West Media, when Kerry Stokes was chairman, paid for 12 months rent, sex workers and cocaine etc for Bruce Lehrmann for 2 interviews where he attacked his victim, Brittany Higgins.

At the time of Bruce Lehrmann – Channel Seven interviews Lehrmann was suing Channel 10 and Lisa Wilkinson for defamation and Brittany Higgins was a key witness.

So, Lehrmann attacking Higgins on Channel 7 was clearly an attempt to intimidate a witness and both Lehrmann and Seven management should have been charged for the crime.

Kerry Stokes v Shane Dowling

Kerry Stokes sued me with 4 SLAPP lawsuits from 2014 until 2022 and my guess is it cost anywhere between $5 million to $10 million in legal fees for the 4 matters.

Most of the legal fees would have been paid by Seven West Media shareholders, for 3 matters, and the rest by Capilano Honey shareholders, for 1 matter, of which Stokes was a also a major shareholder.

Neither Seven West Media shareholder nor Capilano Honey shareholders ever got any value out of the SLAPP lawsuits against me nor did they ever get costs from me even though they were awarded costs.

Kerry Stokes is a spiteful and vindictive person and I have no doubt he would have come after me for costs just to have me bankrupted but the problem he had was to do so would show who paid the legal fees and that would show financial fraud by Stokes.

One example is that his first lawsuit against me was known as Munsie v Dowling where Kerry Stokes and his lawyer Justine Munsie sued me for defamation.

Justine Munsie was suing me while also being paid to represent Kerry Stokes which is scandalous and criminal and I have no doubt Seven paid for the matter.

So, if Seven came after me for costs the first question would be why was Seven paying for Justine Munsie to represent Kerry Stokes in a matter where she was also an applicant with Kerry Stokes.

Lawyers reading this would be thinking I have to be joking about Justine Munsie suing me in a defamation case while also being paid to represent the other applicant Kerry Stokes. I’m not joking.

Below is the first page of Justine Munsie’s 2014 affidavit where she says at paragraph one she is “the first plaintiff” and at paragraph 2 she says “I am authorised by Kerry Stokes, the second plaintiff, to write this affidavit”.

A lawyer can write an affidavit for a client who is a “plaintiff”. But a “plaintiff” cannot write an affidavit for another “plaintiff” otherwise it is blatant witness collusion as they are both witnesses.

And a lawyer who is a plaintiff certainly can’t be paid to write an affidavit for another plaintiff in the same case. Yes, I raised it many times in court and the judges ignored it.

But it helps explain why Stokes and Seven never came after me for costs because to do so would drag in other people to the crime and they would have to produce the evidence of Justine Munsie being paid by Seven which would confirm their crimes.

What Kerry Stokes’ media demise means for Australia’s media landscape

Kerry Stokes’ influence on a national basis has never been as great as Rupert Murdoch but in Westren Australia it has been arguably greater than Murdoch.

Stokes has had the only paper, The West Australian and Channel 7 and other media in WA for years and that has made him very influential in WA politics which has also helped Stokes influence national politics.

Kerry Stokes has always used his political influence for his own greed and Australia will be better off now his media influence is almost zero.

I tried to give a broad overview above of my knowledge and experience with Kerry Stokes but the bottom line is, Stokes is a crook and always will be.

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