Feds examining way to get Big Tech to pay up
OTTAWA • The federal heritage minister says if new tools are needed to get digital
giants to pay for Canadian
content, they will be built.
Steven Guilbeault says he is watching how other countries are trying to get companies such as Facebook and Google to pay for the copyrighted content that appears on their online platforms.
Australia and France have moved ahead on measures to help domestic media outlets, which often say they are losing ad money to international digital giants.
With a global decline in ad dollars due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, calls are growing louder for Canada to follow suit.
Guilbeault says Australia and France have regulatory or legislative options that might not be on the table in
Canada.
But he told the House of
Commons industry committee Monday night that he is reviewing what is, or what might be needed.
Facebook and Google have both said they are strong supporters of local journalism, pointing to related funds and causes they support in the countries where they have a presence.
But Guilbeault says the government is still examining the issue closely.
“We've said for many months that we want the web giants to do their fair share, and clearly right now they're not,” he said in response to a question from fellow Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-smith.
“If we can use existing
tools to make that happen, we will, and if we need to create new tools, we will.”
Earlier this month, several
Canadian publishers banded
together and published an open letter demanding the government force digital companies to share advertis
ing revenues with Canadian
media outlets.
While the sector was already struggling ahead of
the COVID-19 pandemic, a
dramatic decline in advertising revenue has placed significant additional pressure on the companies.
One estimate suggests 50 community newspapers have closed since the outbreak of the pandemic, with 100 media outlets making cuts to operations in sixweek period.
As many as 2,000 people have also lost their jobs, indicates an analysis conducted by the local news research project at Ryerson University's School of Journalism, the journalism news site
J-source and the Canadian
Association of Journalists.
In March, the Liberal
government announced a $30-million ad campaign
for COVID-19 awareness
as a stop-gap measure as it moves to roll out additional support to the media industry in the form of tax credits announced last year.
Guilbeault said the ads were placed in more than 900 newspapers, on 500 radio and television stations and in 12 different languages.
Altogether, 97 per cent of
the money was spent in Canadian media, he said. He did not say where the remaining three per cent of funds were spent.
Both Facebook and Google have, in the past, pointed to their own financial support of local journalism,
both in Canada and other
countries.
Facebook has given US$5,000 grants to around
80 Canadian news outlets in
recent weeks as part of a major financial effort to support
COVID-19 related journalism here and in the United States.
Google has also allocated funds from its news initiative program to some Canadian media outlets, including The Canadian Press.
Facebook and Google did not immediately respond for comment.