Rookie mistake from a rookie minister
Guilbeault backtracks on media licensing
In any field of endeavour other than politics, a rookie making a rookie mistake would be greeted with equanimity.
But Steven Guilbeault has just learned the hard way that the parliamentary waters are full of sharks, circling and waiting for traces of blood.
Justin Trudeau’s new heritage minister appeared on CTV’S Question
Period show on Sunday to offer the nation the benefit of his inexperience.
He was grilled by host Evan Solomon about a report from a panel tasked by the government to review Canada’s communications legislative framework.
A key recommendation was to extend licences currently granted to radio and television stations to all media content, along with a much stricter compliance regime.
Did the minister buy the recommendations, he was asked.
The reply was unequivocal. “We would ask that they have a licence, yes,” he said.
Anyone following the controversy over the labour-based tax credit the Liberals introduced last year — i.e. the $600-million “media bailout” — would know that this is terrain that might produce a confusion of ideas: namely, that the government and the credit’s beneficiaries believe it is saving quality journalism; while everyone else thinks it’s a transparent bribe.
Guilbeault appeared unconcerned as he waded into this minefield. Solomon pointed out that the new super-regulator would police links to the websites of “Canadian sources of accurate, trusted and reliable sources of news with a view to ensuring a diversity of voices.” Who would determine what constitutes a trusted news source, Solomon asked: “The government?”
The minister sniffed danger and said the panel had made recommendations and the government would study them. “I’ve heard people say, ‘Oh God, the government is going to decide what we see on the web.’ Canada isn’t about to take over the world wide web,” he said.
But he then proceeded to give the impression that this government is indeed bent on extending its dominion over news content.
The explosion of indignation on social media was as highly charged as if Guilbeault had suggested a Canadian beaver cull.
WE WOULD ASK THAT (MEDIA OUTLETS) HAVE A LICENCE, YES. — MINISTER OF CANADIAN HERITAGE STEVEN GUILBEAULT ON SUNDAY
LET ME BE CLEAR. OUR GOVERNMENT HAS NO INTENTION TO IMPOSE LICENSING REQUIREMENTS ON NEWS ORGANIZATIONS NOR WILL WE TRY TO REGULATE NEWS CONTENT. — MINISTER OF CANADIAN HERITAGE STEVEN GUILBEAULT ON MONDAY
It was then, no surprise to see a contrite minister appear before the media on Monday morning heading in precisely the opposite direction to the one he wandered so blithely the day before. “Let me be clear, our government has no intention to impose licensing requirements on news organizations or regulate news content,” he said.
He suggested that the recommendations were aimed at cultural content and did not apply to news media organizations. He said he was clarifying his position because he could see “people are confused.”
That tends to happen when politicians say one thing one day and another the next.
Guilbeault’s atonement was necessary, since it allowed Trudeau to bat away Conservative barbs in question period, such as Andrew Scheer’s one-liner that George Orwell’s novel 1984 was meant as a “cautionary tale, not an instruction manual.”
Trudeau said the report proposed an exemption from licensing for news media, which is a generous reading of the text. (It actually says the regulator “would have broad powers to exempt in instances in which regulation is neither necessary nor appropriate to achieve cultural policy objectives.”)
But the predominant theme of the report is that the online world is a Wild West that needs a new sheriff. Companies delivering media content by means of the internet would be required to register with the new Canadian Communications Commission (no mention here of any exemptions for news organizations). The new regulator would enforce obligations to produce Canadian content and “impose spending requirement or levies.” The panel also suggested a strengthened compliance regime that could impose codes of conduct and administrative financial penalties for anyone who stepped out of line.
To be fair, the panel was attempting to resolve some legitimate competitive quandaries. It recommended the Cbc/radio Canada should eliminate advertising on all platforms over the next five years, so that it is not competing with private broadcasters. It also recognized the parasitical nature of sharing platforms like Facebook by suggesting regulatory intervention to ensure that creators of news are compensated for the use of their original content.
But the suggested solutions were too bureaucratic and too heavy-handed to win broad support.
Two-thirds of Canadians don’t trust politicians — a number that rises even higher among Conservative supporters. Conspiracy theories abound that this government has bought off its critics. Only a minister in his salad days, still green in judgment, would have added fuel to those intrigues.