Big publishers and TV networks, including the CBC, are up for more than a third of a billion dollars a year under cabinet’s Bill C-18, the Parliamentary Budget Office said yesterday. Independent publishers opposed to the bill have called it another federal subsidy for distrusted media..“We expect news businesses to receive total compensation around $329.2 million per year from digital platforms,” said a Budget Office report Cost Estimate For Bill C-18 Online News Act. Federal expenses to oversee payments would average $5.6 million a year, said analysts..According to Blacklock's Reporter, Bill C-18 the Online News Act would compel Google and Facebook to pay newsrooms a portion of ad revenues generated by linked stories. The bill would also grant publishers an exemption from federal anti-trust law in negotiating secret revenue settlements with social media companies..The Department of Heritage that sponsored the bill has acknowledged the largest beneficiary would be the CBC. The Crown broadcaster operates free news websites that claim an average 21.7 million unique visits per month. CBC websites are already financed through $54.8 million yearly ad sales and the corporation’s $1.3 billion annual parliamentary grant..Independent publishers in testimony at the House of Commons heritage committee criticized Bill C-18 as another federal subsidy for money-losing corporate media. “Struggling media corporations are using every last iota of their dwindling financial and social capital to lobby for subsidies,” Jen Gerson, co-founder of the online newsletter The Line, testified September 23..Federal interference in news operations ensured “journalists are not well liked by the general public who have a negative opinion of the press corps that is perceived to be on the take,” added Gerson. Parliament in 2019 amended the Income Tax Act to pay $595 million in payroll rebates to publishers who applied for aid and were individually approved by the Canada Revenue Agency..“Canadians are expressing unprecedented distrust towards the news and the reporters who deliver it,” Jeanette Ageson, publisher of the website The Tyee, testified September 27. “Canadians need to know who is funding the news they receive and on what terms.”.Peter Menzies, formerly a CRTC commissioner and editor of the Calgary Herald, said Bill C-18 was an indirect subsidy for media. “It looks like a subsidy to me,” Menzies testified September 27. “It’s going to create more mistrust and it’s not going to end well.”.“The more government assistance news media gets, the more broken the relationship with readers becomes,” said Menzies. “The more that relationship is broken, the more subsidy will be required.”.The Western Standard refuses to accept government bailout money.
