Hon. Frances Lankin: Thank you, Senator Housakos, for putting forward your views. I would like to, in my question, set aside the matter of the CBC because I think there are many other points of debate that come into it, and that polarized view held among some of us in this chamber won’t be resolved through this particular bill.

I spent a number of years as chair of the Ontario Press Council and then the inaugural chair of the National NewsMedia Council. It has been my experience that any newspaper that brings forward critical arguments, whether it is of one political party’s positions or another, is named “fake news.” I have heard it many times from across the floor as well.

Here is what I want to understand from you: The voices of those small community newspapers that many of us in rural Ontario and across Canada rely on have largely been cancelled out and have not been able to have the resources and the staffing to do local investigative journalism. They rely on The Canadian Press and other feeds.

Your proposal doesn’t address how this issue will get resolved. Surely some of the $81 million is better than nothing at all. Could you speak to what the solution is, please?