Last week, the Broadcast and Telecommunications Legislative Review Panel released their final report on the state of communications in Canada, which proposes massive . . .
changes to the regulation of online media.
Entitled “Communications Future: Time to Act”, the report was prepared by a panel of experts, who received submissions from more than 2,000 academics, industry associations and lobbyists. Weighing in at nearly 300 pages, the mammoth report includes 97 recommendations for the government on a wide range of issues, from internet affordability to the role of the CBC. The Liberals formed the panel back in 2018 and have signalled they wish to move forward quickly with legislation based on the report’s recommendations.
The amount of proposals are far too numerous to be tackled in a single editorial but several stand out as cause for concern.
The report suggests that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) should have its name changed to the Canadian Communications Commission (CCC), denoting the fact that people are largely getting their news, entertainment and social interactions through online platforms. After decades of regulating a relatively small amount of companies through several tightly controlled mediums, the panel recommended that this dated system of enforcing and promoting “Canadian content”, be applied to the internet.
It’s the panel’s view that the CCC should be able to regulate streaming giants like Netflix or Disney+ and force them to pay tax and invest in the production and promotion of Canadian media. How they plan on getting international multi-billion dollar corporations to comply with Canadian law is unclear. Do we just ask them really nicely? If the bosses at Netflix don’t want to abide by the CCC’s rules, would they be blocked from Canadian cyberspace?
Even more concerning are the proposed regulations for news media. All news sites, from The Equity to Breitbart, Fox News to The New Yorker, would require a license to reach Canadians, with monetary penalties to ensure compliance.
The panel hopes to take the outdated regulations that were created for an insulated TV and radio landscape and apply them to the far reaches of the internet. Media aggregators would be required to prominently display “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 decides what media sources are “trusted” and “reliable?” How would the diversity of their voices be calculated?
University of Ottawa law professor and Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law, Michael Geist, was highly critical of the recommendations dealing with the licensing and registration of media, calling it “the most extensive speech regulation Canada has ever seen.”
Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault appeared on CTV’s Question Period over the weekend and was grilled by host Evan Solomon about how the government plans to ensure foreign news entities comply with Canadian law. Guilbeault had the gall to shrug his shoulders and state he wasn’t sure “what the big deal [was].”
In that interview he also confirmed that news media should be licensed, but said that it would be “proportional”, whatever that means.
After receiving heavy criticism online from Geist and numerous media commentators, Guilbeault called a press conference on Monday to try and “clarify” his remarks. Contradicting what he said just hours before, Guilbeault said the government has no interest in imposing licensing requirements on news media, or regulating news content.
Phew, how reassuring.
It’s admirable to try and ensure the production of Canadian content and to tax global media giants that make billions of dollars off Canadian viewers. However, expanding the scope of an organization that previously regulated a relatively small, insulated broadcasting industry to encompass the entire internet is absolutely ludicrous.
The government plans to introduce legislation based on these recommendations by the end of the year and based on the blasé response by their rookie cabinet minister, Canadians have good reason to be concerned.
Caleb Nickerson
