Connect with us
[the_ad id="89560"]

Business

Government laws designed to rescue Canadian media have done the opposite

Published

1 year ago

12 minute read

From the MacDonald-Laurier Institute

This article first appeared as the cover story to our September 2023 issue of Inside Policy. You can download the full issue here.

By Peter Menzies, October 4, 2023

The federal government has made a regulatory mess with wrongheaded legislation targeting digital media content.

Few things are more fundamental to a nation’s economic prosperity and social cohesion than a robust communications framework.

Canada has its challenges in terms of rural and northern internet and mobile connectivity, but the nation’s overall communications mainframe is, by most international measures, in good shape. The rest of the story involving what gets carried on the mainframe (i.e., the actual content) isn’t as pretty. In fact, two recent communications policy initiatives proposed by the federal government have put tens of thousands of jobs at risk in the creative and news industries.

Money goes where it is likely to generate profit, and if some key arteries aren’t unclogged quickly, the flow of communications investment dollars in Canada could seize up. Worse, the future of what has been a thriving creative economy, driven by independent content creators, is now uncertain.

Meanwhile, the news industry is on the cusp of becoming permanently reliant on government subsidies – a dependency that’s certain to undermine the public’s already wavering trust in its independence.

But first, the good news. While measures vary by source and date, Canada consistently ranks among the world’s top 20 nations when it comes to fixed broadband connectivity, and as high as No. 1 in the world when it comes to mobile internet capacity. Given that most of nations in the top ten for broadband connectivity are smaller in landmass than Prince Edward Island, this is a considerable achievement for a country the size of Canada. This connectivity, however, has come at a premium – consumer in this country are historically among those paying the highest rates anywhere in the world, particularly when it comes to mobile plans. Costs to consumers remain high but have been trending downward in recent years as carriers shift strategic priorities from acquiring new consumers to retaining existing ones.

Far more challenging is a regulatory environment that is less than friendly when it comes to attracting private investment. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has been risk-averse in its dealings with Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNOs) and smaller Internet Service Providers (ISPs) looking for competitive access rates to incumbent networks. Still, competition is one area that appears to be a priority for the CRTC. The regulator’s new chair, Vicky Eatrides, has a background in competition policy; a new vice chair, Adam Scott, is thoroughly familiar with the Telecom industrial framework; and the new Ontario Regional Commissioner, Bram Abramson, has experience as a regulatory officer for a smaller telco. (Abramson’s former employer, TekSavvy Solutions, recently waved the white flag in its efforts to compete in the Canadian market and put itself up for sale.)

Now the bad news – and, fair warning, there’s a lot of it.

Canada is aggressively regulating the internet – not in priority areas such as privacy, algorithms and data collection, but in terms of its content and its users’ freedom of navigation. The Online Streaming Act (Bill C-11) came into force in the spring, amending the Broadcasting Act to define the internet’s audio and video content as “broadcasting” and, as such, placing all this content under the authority of the CRTC. The goals remain the same as they did during the broadcast radio and cable television world of the early 1990s: the funding of certified TV and film properties, ensuring Canadian content (CanCon) gets priority over foreign programming and ensuring designated groups – BIPOC and LGBTQ2S, among other acronyms – and official language minorities are represented. How exactly the CRTC intends to achieve this without disrupting what has been a booming decade for film and television production in a freewheeling global market remains to be seen. As does how it will give its supply-managed content priority without imposing economic harm on the 100,000 Canadians who earn a living in the unlicensed, uncertified world of YouTube and other major streaming platforms.

While the CRTC has promised to provide at least preliminary answers to these questions by the end of next year, years of regulatory haggling and court challenges await and the regulator’s reputation for the timely resolution of matters is spotty at best. As of September 22, for instance, it still hadn’t dealt with a cabinet order to review its CBC licensing decision; a decision which, itself, which took 18 months for the regulator to reach (following a January 2021 hearing that was held three years after the term of the CBC’s previous license had expired). Regulatory sloth of this nature on a routine matter does not inspire much optimism for the expedient handling of the far more complex issue of online streaming.

Indeed, the burden of the Online Streaming Act has already overwhelmed the CRTC’s administrative capacities. In August, it autorenewed the licenses of 343 television channels, discretionary services, and cable and satellite services for two to three years each. It subsequently announced it wouldn’t be dealing with any radio matters at all for “at least” two years. It even nervously punted a demand for the cancellation of Fox News’ Canadian carriage into the future by declaring it necessary to re-do the entire framework involving cable carriage of foreign television channels. It has clearly signaled that it plans to manage nothing other than telecom and Online Streaming Act issues for years to come. Everything else is on hold until such time comes to initiate a catch-up process that, in turn, will itself take years to clear the logjam. All this at a time of significant disruption that demands corporate and regulatory nimbleness.

But even what appears to be catastrophic regulatory arrest pales in comparison to the impact of the federal government’s second significant piece of new internet legislation: the Online News Act. Rarely has legislation designed to assist a sector – news production – been so poorly constructed that it has managed to make everything worse for everyone involved.

Based on the unproven premise that Big Tech companies were profiting from “stealing” content from news organizations, the Act was designed to force Meta (Facebook’s parent company) and Google to redistribute their considerable advertising revenue to those who used to receive the lion’s share of this revenue – newspapers and broadcasters. From the beginning, Meta indicated that the premise and the cost of the legislation, unless amended, would force it to cease the carriage of links to news stories and suspend its existing support programs for Canadian journalism.

The government and the news industry lobbyists who backed the bill grossly overestimated their economic value to Meta and insisted the tech giant was bluffing. Last week, however, Brian Myles, Director of Le Devoir, told an online panel hosted by the Canadian Journalism Foundation that it was clear Meta wasn’t bluffing and, going forward, news organizations would have to adapt to its exit from the market and the considerable financial impact it will have on their industry. He nevertheless held out hope that a rapprochement of some kind might still be possible with Google.

Like Meta, Google has indicated that it, too, will suspend both news linkage and its current partnerships with Canadian news organizations, unless the federal government can provide more economically acceptable options than what it has heretofore offered. As much financial harm as Meta’s departure will cause, there is consensus that Google’s departure – if it occurs – would be a disaster on a nuclear scale.

Even if a deal is reached, the best the news industry can hope for is that Google’s financial concessions will offset a portion of the losses suffered from losing access to Facebook, Instagram and Threads (among other Meta properties). Any money that can be squeezed out of an agreement with Google would be meaningful but a far cry from the hundreds of millions the industry was dreaming of a year ago. The largest recipients of any such windfall, of course, will be those who least need it – namely CBC and Bellmedia.

The bottom line is that, following passage the Online News Act, there will be less revenue for Canadian news organizations than there was just a few months ago. As a result, publishers are pleading for “temporary” measures such as the Journalism Labour Tax Credit and Local Journalism Initiative to be not just extended but enhanced. Up to 35 percent of legacy newsrooms costs would be covered by the federal government while, without Facebook, it will be near impossible for local news innovators outside of the legacy bubble to build audiences.

Next up is an anticipated Online Harms Act, designed to control “lawful but awful” speech through a government-appointed Digital Safety Commissioner. Expect more policy mayhem in the months to come.

Peter Menzies is a senior fellow at MLI and a former vice-chair of the CRTC.

Before Post

Related Topics:

Todayville is a digital media and technology company. We profile unique stories and events in our community. Register and promote your community event for free.

Follow Author

More from this author
Crime / 3 hours ago

First Good Battlefield News From Trump’s Global War on Fentanyl

Opinion / 8 hours ago

Some scientists advocate creating human bodies for ‘spare parts.’

International / 10 hours ago

Trump’s ‘Golden Dome’ defense shield must be built now, Lt. Gen. warns

Business

Saskatchewan becomes first Canadian province to fully eliminate carbon tax

Published on April 1, 2025

By

From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

Saskatchewan has become the first Canadian province to free itself entirely of the carbon tax.

On March 27, Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe announced the removal of the provincial industrial carbon tax beginning April 1, boosting the province’s industry and making Saskatchewan the first carbon tax free province.

“The immediate effect is the removal of the carbon tax on your Sask Power bills, saving Saskatchewan families and small businesses hundreds of dollars a year. And in the longer term, it will reduce the cost of other consumer products that have the industrial carbon tax built right into their price,” said Moe.

Under Moe’s direction, Saskatchewan has dropped the industrial carbon tax which he says will allow Saskatchewan to thrive under a “tariff environment.”

“I would hope that all of the parties running in the federal election would agree with those objectives and allow the provinces to regulate in this area without imposing the federal backstop,” he continued.

The removal of the tax is estimated to save Saskatchewan residents up to 18 cents a liter in gas prices.

The removal of the tax will take place on April 1, the same day the consumer carbon tax will reduce to 0 percent under Prime Minister Mark Carney’s direction. Notably, Carney did not scrap the carbon tax legislation: he just reduced its current rate to zero. This means it could come back at any time.

Furthermore, while Carney has dropped the consumer carbon tax, he has previously revealed that he wishes to implement a corporation carbon tax, the effects of which many argued would trickle down to all Canadians.

The Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities (SARM) celebrated Moe’s move, noting that the carbon tax was especially difficult on farmers.

“It puts our farming community and our business people in rural municipalities at a competitive disadvantage, having to pay this and compete on the world stage,” he continued.

“We’ve got a carbon tax on power — and that’s going to be gone now — and propane and natural gas and we use them more and more every year, with grain drying and different things in our farming operations,” he explained.

“I know most producers that have grain drying systems have three-phase power. If they haven’t got natural gas, they have propane to fire those dryers. And that cost goes on and on at a high level, and it’s made us more noncompetitive on a world stage,” Huber decalred.

The carbon tax is wildly unpopular and blamed for the rising cost of living throughout Canada. Currently, Canadians living in provinces under the federal carbon pricing scheme pay $80 per tonne.

Continue Reading

Automotive

Electric cars just another poor climate policy

Published on April 1, 2025

By

From the Fraser Institute

By Bjørn Lomborg

The electric car is widely seen as a symbol of a simple, clean solution to climate change. In reality, it’s inefficient, reliant on massive subsidies, and leaves behind a trail of pollution and death that is seldom acknowledged.

We are constantly reminded by climate activists and politicians that electric cars are cleaner, cheaper, and better. Canada and many other countries have promised to prohibit the sale of new gas and diesel cars within a decade. But if electric cars are really so good, why would we need to ban the alternatives?

And why has Canada needed to subsidize each electric car with a minimum $5,000 from the federal government and more from provincial governments to get them bought? Many people are not sold on the idea of an electric car because they worry about having to plan out where and when to recharge. They don’t want to wait for an uncomfortable amount of time while recharging; they don’t want to pay significantly more for the electric car and then see its used-car value decline much faster. For people not privileged to own their own house, recharging is a real challenge. Surveys show that only 15 per cent of Canadians and 11 per cent of Americans want to buy an electric car.

The main environmental selling point of an electric car is that it doesn’t pollute. It is true that its engine doesn’t produce any CO₂ while driving, but it still emits carbon in other ways. Manufacturing the car generates emissions—especially producing the battery which requires a large amount of energy, mostly achieved with coal in China. So even when an electric car is being recharged with clean power in BC, over its lifetime it will emit about one-third of an equivalent gasoline car. When recharged in Alberta, it will emit almost three-quarters.

In some parts of the world, like India, so much of the power comes from coal that electric cars end up emitting more CO₂ than gasoline cars. Across the world, on average, the International Energy Agency estimates that an electric car using the global average mix of power sources over its lifetime will emit nearly half as much CO₂ as a gasoline-driven car, saving about 22 tonnes of CO₂.

But using an electric car to cut emissions is incredibly ineffective. On America’s longest-established carbon trading system, you could buy 22 tonnes of carbon emission cuts for about $660 (US$460). Yet, Ottawa is subsidizing every electric car to the tune of $5,000 or nearly ten times as much, which increases even more if provincial subsidies are included. And since about half of those electrical vehicles would have been bought anyway, it is likely that Canada has spent nearly twenty-times too much cutting CO₂ with electric cars than it could have. To put it differently, Canada could have cut twenty-times more CO₂ for the same amount of money.

Moreover, all these estimates assume that electric cars are driven as far as gasoline cars. They are not. In the US, nine-in-ten households with an electric car actually have one, two or more non-electric cars, with most including an SUV, truck or minivan. Moreover, the electric car is usually driven less than half as much as the other vehicles, which means the CO₂ emission reduction is much smaller. Subsidized electric cars are typically a ‘second’ car for rich people to show off their environmental credentials.

Electric cars are also 320–440 kilograms heavier than equivalent gasoline cars because of their enormous batteries. This means they will wear down roads faster, and cost societies more. They will also cause more air pollution by shredding more particulates from tire and road wear along with their brakes. Now, gasoline cars also pollute through combustion, but electric cars in total pollute more, both from tire and road wear and from forcing more power stations online, often the most polluting ones. The latest meta-study shows that overall electric cars are worse on particulate air pollution. Another study found that in two-thirds of US states, electric cars cause more of the most dangerous particulate air pollution than gasoline-powered cars.

These heavy electric cars are also more dangerous when involved in accidents, because heavy cars more often kill the other party. A study in Nature shows that in total, heavier electric cars will cause so many more deaths that the toll could outweigh the total climate benefits from reduced CO₂ emissions.

Many pundits suggest electric car sales will dominate gasoline cars within a few decades, but the reality is starkly different. A 2023-estimate from the Biden Administration shows that even in 2050, more than two-thirds of all cars globally will still be powered by gas or diesel.

Source: US Energy Information Administration, reference scenario, October 2023
Fossil fuel cars, vast majority is gasoline, also some diesel, all light duty vehicles, the remaining % is mostly LPG.

Electric vehicles will only take over when innovation has made them better and cheaper for real. For now, electric cars run not mostly on electricity but on bad policy and subsidies, costing hundreds of billions of dollars, blocking consumers from choosing the cars they want, and achieving virtually nothing for climate change.

Bjørn Lomborg

Continue Reading

Trending

X