Justin Stevens has resigned as the ABC’s director of news and current affairs after four years in the job, setting up a leadership change in Australia’s biggest newsroom. He will step down in the coming months.
Stevens, the former executive producer of 7.30, became director of news and current affairs in 2022 and has overseen a period of vast change inside the broadcaster’s newsroom. His departure came today, while the ABC’s search for his replacement is already close to completion.
That timing matters because the exit comes before the handover is finished, leaving the broadcaster with a senior news desk in transition even as one of its most important internal searches nears an end. Stevens had been the ABC’s most senior news executive, so his resignation marks a clear shift at the top rather than a routine personnel move.
The sequence also points to a managed transition rather than an abrupt break. Stevens is not leaving immediately, and the search for the next director is already advanced, which suggests the ABC is moving to limit disruption inside a newsroom that has been in flux under his watch. The question now is not whether the change will happen, but how quickly the broadcaster can complete it and settle the newsroom around its next leader.
