44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 13, 2022 10:00AM
Mr. Speaker, first, I would like to wish everyone in this chamber and all of the people of Saskatoon a merry Christmas and a very happy new year.
This is the time of the year that many of us get to spend with family, friends and other loved ones. For some of us, it is truly a joyous season full of wonderment. For others, the holiday season reminds us of people lost and of relations lost. It is a hard time for those individuals.
As we all reflect on the past year and look forward to the next year, I want to offer these words of hope to all of the good folks throughout Saskatoon. May 2023 bring new beginnings, peace, good health and prosperity to members and their families.
As the member of Parliament representing the west side of Saskatoon, I will continue to work hard to raise up our city, our neighbourhoods and each of us to the best that we can be in 2023.
As we get into these last days of 2022, Bill C-18 has landed back in the House of Commons for its final round of debate before being shipped off to the other place. This legislation is one of three Internet censorship laws that the NDP-Liberal government has brought in since the last election.
Its goal is to ensure that voices other than its own, and news stories it does not like, are silenced in our democracy. I had the chance to speak to Bill C-11, which would have given almost dictator-like powers to a branch of the federal government to decide what people post on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok and other Internet platforms.
If the content is not in line with the NDP-Liberal messaging of the day, algorithms would be manipulated to remove that content from one's feeds and searches. Members do not have to take my word for it. The head of that very government agency admitted as much to the Senate committee when it took up that legislation. What is worse, the NDP-Liberals just shrug their shoulders because that was the very point of the legislation.
This legislation, Bill C-18, is the second Internet censorship law that the NDP-Liberals are forcing down the throats of Canadians. Simply put, this law would force Facebook, Google and other Internet companies to prioritize CBC and other government-approved news outlets on our feed over the smaller alternative news media platforms that may be more critical of the NDP-Liberal view of the world.
The third piece of legislation currently before this Parliament is Bill C-27, which I hope to address in the new year. That legislation is the so-called digital privacy legislation, which is a laughable topic from an NDP-Liberal government that tracked millions of Canadian’s cell phones during the pandemic without their consent and has been responsible for the personal data of hundreds of thousands of Canadians ending up on the dark web.
The truth is that the Internet and social media are an integrated part of our lives today. Until now, they have been an unfettered part of our lives. Canadians use social media platforms to access and share a variety of different news articles and information among colleagues, family and friends. Canadians I talk to are very worried that these three laws will limit their ability to have open conversations online.
For legislation that is supposedly about promoting online news, the NDP-Liberals and their allies in the CBC and traditional media have been spreading a lot of misinformation about it. The current government wants to have Bill C-18 so it can use algorithms to keep information it does not like away from our feeds and Internet searches.
Bill C-18 essentially grants the government the ability to force online platforms, such as Facebook and Google, to sign deals under the duress of government penalty to promote government-approved content. These commercial agreements do not just have to be acceptable to the platform and the news organization but to the government as well.
The government agency in charge of implementing Bill C-18’s censorship provisions is called the CRTC, and it would oversee every step of this process to ensure they are satisfactory to the NDP-Liberals. Surprise, surprise, all nine members of the CRTC are appointed by the Liberal Minister of Heritage.
I am not the only one seeing past the government’s spin on this. Outside experts such as Michael Geist, who is the research chair in Internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa, said this at the heritage committee in relation to Bill C-18, “Bill C-18’s dangerous approach…regulates which platforms must pay in order to permit expression from their users and dictates which sources are entitled to compensation.”
The former vice-chair of the CRTC, Peter Menzies, told the committee how the government can influence news companies:
You could end up with companies wishing to please the CRTC or the CRTC feeling pressure to make sure money in newsrooms is spent on certain topics, and they might be good topics, but it's frankly none of their business to have.... An independent press spends its money on whatever it wants.
Who are we to believe, the independent experts or the CBC, which is already in the pockets of the NDP-Liberal government?
A question that comes to mind is who benefits the most from this Internet censorship? It certainly is not the average everyday user of the Internet who is logging into their feed to keep up with the news. It is definitely not the independent journalists trying to make a living and provide accurate news. It could be no other than the legacy media, more specifically the folks at the CBC.
The CBC and other legacy news organizations have been complaining for years about their inability to keep up with the modern online news media. Then they proceeded to lobby the government for $600 million in bailouts. CBC, for example, rakes in $1.2 billion in federal funding and receives $250 million in combined TV and online advertising revenue, yet it still struggles to survive in the Canadian market, as it cannot keep up with the modern tech era.
This is where Bill C-18 comes to play. The government is looking to tip the scales further in CBC's favour. The government has decided that it is a bad look to continue giving more billion-dollar bailouts to the CBC, so now the government is forcing tech companies like Facebook and Google to make NDP-Liberal approved commercial deals to fund the legacy media.
Instead, the legacy media should be competing on the open market, as many independent journalists are doing as we speak. At the end of the day, online platforms and Canadian taxpayers should not be footing the bill if the legacy media is unable to keep up with the times.
Let us talk about how this legislation would affect the news Canadians access.
Bill C-18 would prohibit digital intermediary operators from giving what the CRTC determines as “preference” in news ranking. That sounds relatively fine, does it not? No, it is not. With this unclear language added into the bill, just about anyone could call up the CRTC to contest their ranking and be brought up to the top of any search engine or platform.
I think this gets to the heart of the matter. Trying to regulate content on the Internet will always introduce bias into the conversation. At best, it is an innocent hassle. At worst, it can be used by the government to suppress real information and control people. In my view, the risk of the worst case is not worth it. As they say, the juice is not worth the squeeze.
Let us talk about Google, Facebook, TikTok, Twitter and the Internet in general.
First let me say that Elon Musk's recent purchase of Twitter has shaken up Silicon Valley and the status quo in big tech quite a bit and has perhaps breathed some fresh air into what was becoming a stale industry. His commitment to free speech and his willingness to stand up to the powers that be show how big tech can directly influence elections or stay neutral, as they should.
Of course, in Canada, this legislation has the potential to tip the scales toward the NDP-Liberals during elections. Big tech recognizes that and they do not want to be tools of censorship in Canada or anywhere else.
Last spring, I met the executives of Google and it was an eye-opening experience. They are concerned. They worry that Bill C-18 does not have the tools to provide relief to smaller news outlets. After all, it was not the small independent news outlets that wanted this in the first place. It was the large media networks that lobbied for this to get done and that are now foaming at the mouth to get this legislation rammed through Parliament.
Members should not kid themselves. Google is not just afraid for its bottom line. It is a multi-billion dollar business and will absorb the costs associated with this legislation. Its real fear is about freedom of speech on the Internet. They may run worldwide organizations, but the Silicon Valley boys are still hackers at heart, living out of their mothers' basements playing Halo, sharing on Twitch and posting on Reddit. Google is concerned that the government is making it more difficult for Canadians to access quality information.
I also met with Amazon World Services in the summer, and we talked about a variety of issues related to this legislation. I can tell members that Google and Amazon do not just meet random opposition members from Saskatoon unless they have real concerns about where this country is going. It is Canadians who are the best judge of what content they want to consume, not some government bureaucrats.
We have seen Canadian content creators thrive in an open and competitive market, one being Hitesh Sharma, a Punjabi hip-hop artist from Saskatchewan who built up a large following on TikTok and later made it to the Junos. He did not need the CRTC to give him a path to fame.
It is very important that we allow our creators, whether they are influencers or media, to flourish against the top creators in the world. That is not to say we should not support our local media when we can, but we should recognize the talent we already have, all of whom have succeeded without the involvement of big government interference.
With Bill C-18, local Canadian content creators could be squeezed out of our newsfeeds and replaced with the CBC. I guess that is fine for the few people who tune into CBC on a regular basis, but for most people, especially younger people, the desire is for a free and open Internet where we can search for whatever we want, free of interference by government or anyone else. That is what Canadians want.
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- Dec/13/22 3:09:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the government loves to tax Canadians. It implements schemes such as its ineffective carbon tax, a plan that has done absolutely nothing to lower emissions while it attacks the economic lifeblood of western Canada, yet it expects the good people of Saskatchewan to pay more in ever-rising taxes.
This Christmas, will the Liberals finally stop forcing their failed carbon tax on Canadians?
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Madam Speaker, it is an honour to rise and speak in the House once again.
Before I begin, I also want to take a moment to offer my sincere condolences to the family of Jim Carr, the hon. member who passed away, as well as to his colleagues in the Liberal caucus who have worked with him over the years. I want to offer my thoughts and prayers to everyone.
When I decided to run for office in southern Saskatchewan, one of the driving principles for me and generally a lot of people in Saskatchewan was to see less government interference overall in our lives. That is one of the interesting elements in this bill, that it provides an opportunity to have less government interference in people's lives. That is the opportunity that exists with the bill. That is what we are going to get to as we get through the rest of this debate. As the bill has come through committee, we see how some of the interventions at committee reflect that.
Generally, a government bureaucrat in a distant office does not know what is best for individuals in a family given that family's own unique circumstances, so responsibility for those people should be left to the individuals and not to the government.
Usually, when there is a discussion about smaller government in Canada or somewhere else, it has to do with issues of expanding state power, which directly or indirectly restricts people's lives further. This results in less freedom, either because there are fewer options and choices available to make, or because sometimes it gets to the point of trying to plan citizens' lives for them. In this case, the problem with interference is not so obvious when we compare it to something like the situation in George Orwell's 1984, or maybe the other lurking threat that is another government bill, Bill C-11. It got a lot more negative attention in its previous iteration as Bill C-10, and later passed in this Parliament as Bill C-11.
The Liberals want to hand over way too much power to the CRTC with this bill, Bill C-18, which we are debating tonight. The Conservatives stood with the people and policy experts to make our opposition absolutely clear.
When the same Liberal government with the troubling history of Bill C-11 introduces yet another Internet bill, it is reasonable for Canadians to look at it with a healthy dose of skepticism. However, the problem with government does not always come from control or overreach; sometimes it seems friendly and tries to help out with something good, but it can still create problems despite the best intentions. Unfortunately, although what we saw with this bill when it was first drafted was an honest attempt to support small media outlets, it has turned into a large bill that needlessly grows the size of government institutions.
The CRTC already wields a great deal of power in regulating the Internet and the dissemination of information, and now the government wants to further add to it. Should it have the power to determine who is considered a journalist, or the eligibility of a news agency, which is part of the process of this bill?
It does not end there. The CRTC can resolve disputes and issue penalties. As part of that, the bill allows it to set mandatory terms to which both parties, news outlets and platforms, must agree.
What is perhaps most concerning of all is that the CRTC would have the authority to demand information from these platforms and news outlets whenever it pleases.
At the end of the day, Bill C-18 is inflating the size of the CRTC and giving it enormous power, with little accountability, to regulate the news all of us view. This begs the question: What are the impacts of doing this? An important part of a free society is having an independent press and free speech to hold our leaders accountable, but how much can we trust the Liberals to maintain these things? If the government and the Prime Minister want to talk as much as they do about defending democracy and promoting diversity around the world, they need to take these things seriously when it comes to our own country.
Sadly, over the last year they have damaged their national reputation with respect to these values by abusing emergency powers and allowing vulnerable Canadians, including veterans, for example, to be offered death instead of the help they need. They have undermined our freedoms and respect for human dignity.
My fellow Conservatives and I have spoken a lot about the danger of censorship. I also say that I understand the importance of small media organizations and their place in the local communities, because I represent a very large rural riding. To this day, many still rely on these small media organizations to inform them of the happenings both locally and on the global stage, and rural Canada is better off because of it.
There are many of them in my riding, and they all play an essential role. For instance, the Southwest Booster, which is located in Swift Current, has been producing a weekly paper since 1969. We also have the Prairie Post, which covers both southern Saskatchewan and southern Alberta. North of Swift Current, for example, in the small town of Kyle, we also have the Kyle Times, which has been operating for a number of years. Up in the northwest corner of the riding we have papers like Your West Central Voice and the Kindersley Social, both providing a unique perspective on what is happening in their communities.
Cypress Hills—Grasslands is also home to The Shaunavon Standard, which was founded back in 1913, along with the Maple Creek & Southwest Advance Times and the Maple Creek News, which provide a weekly newspaper and distribute it in the southwest corner. In the eastern half of my constituency, we also find many papers such as the Gravelbourg Tribune, The Herald and the Assiniboia Times. All these papers contribute greatly to the social fabric that we find in rural Canada. In a place where most people do not have access to reliable Internet, these papers are critical to keeping my constituents informed.
However, through the transition into a digital world, these organizations have had to adapt and provide their service online. Before the Internet, papers like the ones I mentioned used a physical newsstand or post office boxes to promote themselves, but today, with the Internet, search engines like Google are the updated newsstands. With Bill C-18 the government is trying to interfere with this updated newsstand, and is going too far in doing so.
In this discussion, we also need to talk about the existing government support for media and how we can fix this framework. As I said, having an independent press is fundamental. However, when our media are receiving multi-million dollar payouts from the federal government, their independence quickly comes into question. The common saying, “Never bite the hand that feeds you,” exists for a reason, and I believe it applies to this situation.
Let us be honest: The job of the media is at times to bite, to seek for answers, to find the truth and to hold those in power to account. However, they cannot fully do this when they know it may impact their subsidy. Many Canadians have seen a subtle shift in the private corporate media, with its reporting starting to resemble that of the CBC, which, as a state broadcaster, receives over $1 billion directly from the government. Because of that relationship, the question is raised as to how much the organization can operate like a PR firm of the federal government. That is why we have previously called for reviewing its funding and mandate.
Having said all this, my concerns with Bill C-18 do not stop with media independence and the newly proposed powers of the CRTC, but extend also to the current government's attempt to interfere in a free market. Bill C-18 would require search engines like Google to pay a royalty to an organization that is putting out information, but the government claims this is only minimal market intervention.
Earlier in my speech I talked about many of the small newsprint operations that we have in southwestern Saskatchewan. Here in the House, we have many former members of the press or journalists or those who have been news anchors or different things over the years. I would submit that the majority, if not all the organizations they worked for, would not receive a penny from any of the funds that would be raised by doing this.
First, the government would allow media outlets and organizations to reach a deal on their own. However, if they failed to do this, the CRTC would force both parties into a binding arbitration process whereby the government would get to set the terms of the deal. If an outlet and the organization reached a deal on their own, but the CRTC officials felt the outlet was not using the money appropriately, they would say the deal was invalid and force the two parties through the arbitration process.
They cannot call this “minimal market intervention” when they are giving an institution the power to force two organizations into a binding arbitration process as well as the power to apply hefty fines. A thing is not market-based when the government needs to step in and force two companies to make a deal or face a large fine from the government if they fail to make a deal.
While the government should aim to support small media outlets, protecting their independence should be front of mind. The implications of Bill C-18 are too far-reaching, and with the lack of guidelines there is great potential for the government to abuse this process. That is why we have opposed this bill and will continue to do so.
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Madam Speaker, the member is absolutely right. We talk about our local news media or our local papers, and maybe someone is fortunate enough to have a local TV station. The local news media that is present in Quebec is obviously going to provide the local news and perspective for Quebec, and the local news media in Saskatchewan is going to provide our perspective, but when we see a bill like this, it is not going to boost and enrich the ability of the organizations to do what they are going to do. We are hearing the government say it is absolutely going to do that, but the reality is we always see that it is our small towns and our rural and remote communities that have people who have a diminished voice in this country. They are the ones who are always the first to lose out. They are the first ones to be eliminated because of decisions like this that are made.
We need to support and promote our small-town papers and our small-town TV and radio stations. The bill would not do that.
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