Bill C-10 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Broadcasting Act to, among other things,
(a) add online undertakings — undertakings for the transmission or retransmission of programs over the Internet — as a distinct class of broadcasting undertakings;
(b) update the broadcasting policy for Canada set out in section 3 of that Act by, among other things, providing that the Canadian broadcasting system should serve the needs and interests of all Canadians — including Canadians from racialized communities and Canadians of diverse ethnocultural backgrounds — and should provide opportunities for Indigenous persons, programming that reflects Indigenous cultures and that is in Indigenous languages, and programming that is accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities;
(c) specify that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (the “Commission”) must regulate and supervise the Canadian broadcasting system in a manner that
(i) takes into account the different characteristics of Indigenous language broadcasting and the different conditions under which broadcasting undertakings that provide Indigenous language programming operate,
(ii) is fair and equitable as between broadcasting undertakings providing similar services,
(iii) facilitates the provision of programs that are accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities, and
(iv) takes into account the variety of broadcasting undertakings to which that Act applies and avoids imposing obligations on a class of broadcasting undertakings if doing so will not contribute in a material manner to the implementation of the broadcasting policy;
(d) amend the procedure relating to the issuance by the Governor in Council of policy directions to the Commission;
(e) replace the Commission’s power to impose conditions on a licence with a power to make orders imposing conditions on the carrying on of broadcasting undertakings;
(f) provide the Commission with the power to require that persons carrying on broadcasting undertakings make expenditures to support the Canadian broadcasting system;
(g) authorize the Commission to provide information to the Minister responsible for that Act, the Chief Statistician of Canada and the Commissioner of Competition, and set out in that Act a process by which a person who submits certain types of information to the Commission may designate the information as confidential;
(h) amend the procedure by which the Governor in Council may, under section 28 of that Act, set aside a decision of the Commission to issue, amend or renew a licence or refer such a decision back to the Commission for reconsideration and hearing;
(i) specify that a person shall not carry on a broadcasting undertaking, other than an online undertaking, unless they do so in accordance with a licence or they are exempt from the requirement to hold a licence;
(j) harmonize the punishments for offences under Part II of that Act and clarify that a due diligence defence applies to the existing offences set out in that Act; and
(k) allow for the imposition of administrative monetary penalties for violations of certain provisions of that Act or of the Accessible Canada Act.
The enactment also makes related and consequential amendments to other Acts.

Online Streaming Act

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time tonight with the member for Sarnia—Lambton.

It has been really interesting to sit here listening to the debate because I have sat on the heritage committee for years and went through all the testimony on Bill C-10 and Bill C-11. The only thing I agree on is that the former heritage minister knew nothing about Bill C-10 and that is why he was replaced. I would say the current heritage minister knows very little about Bill C-11, and he too should be replaced. This is an interesting conversation we are having here tonight.

I say that because, when one sits in committee and hears testimony after testimony twice a week for four years, it is kind of interesting. It is true that this bill a dumpster. We have seen it since day one when the former heritage minister tried to explain it. It came back to the House early in June and then we shoved it off to the Senate, only to have the unnecessary election and the bill died. How serious were the Liberals on that? They had an election that did not have to be called if Bill C-10 were so important, but, no, they shoved it to the Senate, called an election that did not need to be called and the bill died. We had to start all over and two years later, here we are again on Bill C-11, and the Liberals are still arguing the same points as they did on Bill C-10. It is interesting.

Now we are dealing with the Senate's proposal on this bill. I will say that the Senate, in my estimation, did a fairly good job on this. It worked hard on this. It spent weeks on Bill C-11. It did not like what we sent it, we being the House of Commons and the committee, so it spent weeks going over this. In fact, it had 26 amendments that it recommended the government look at and put in the bill. That speaks volumes. We never get that many amendments from the red chamber.

Out of the 26 amendments, we understand the government took 18, but it did not take eight. For whatever reason, the government did not like eight amendments from the Senate, which I will get to in just a moment. The concern remains on all sides of the Senate. I know they are flipping each way over there, but they all agreed this bill is a disaster.

In the Conservative caucus, we have talked about this since day one. We have been very vocal on this bill for very good reason. We are very concerned with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission's involvement in Bill C-11. I am very concerned. I do not think it has the capability, in fact I will say that I know it does not have the capability, to really do what is necessary in Bill C-11.

It is not just the Conservative caucus talking about its concerns with Bill C-11. We have heard it from industry experts. We have heard it from academics, content creators and digital platform users. Everybody who came to committee over the last number of years expressed the same concern. Former CRTC vice-chair Peter Menzies spoke twice in committee about his concerns with Bill C-10 and Bill C-11. Dr. Michael Geist has been the most vocal on this, and he should be because he is Canada research chair in Internet law. I think he is one of the foremost thinkers in the country when it comes to Internet regulation. He has written oodles of articles not only denouncing Bill C-10 but also, recently, Bill C-11.

The government claims the platforms must pay their fair share. I have heard over and over today the government claiming that platforms must pay their fair share. This just in: They actually do. The government says it is long overdue. Platforms are among the biggest investors today in Canadian film and television production. There are all-time records in Toronto, Winnipeg, Regina and Vancouver. The business has never been so good. Why is that? It is because Americans are hiring Canadians to do their productions from Toronto, Calgary, Regina, Winnipeg and Vancouver. I could go on and on about the tremendous support in this country for working, paying taxes and shooting documentaries.

TV networks, such as CBC, CTV and Global, do not do documentaries anymore because they are too expensive. However, Netflix and Amazon do documentaries because there is skin in the game. They put well over $1 billion into this country's film and TV production, which is later shown either on streaming devices or sold to the traditional broadcasters.

The Liberals say that we need to support the next generation of Canadian artists. However, Bill C-11 would hurt Canadian artists the most. The Senate was absolutely convinced on this issue. We were, too, on Bill C-11, as were many digital creators, who risk being harmed by the CRTC regulation.

I heard the member for Nunavut the other day, and again a couple of moments ago, explaining that there is concern with this. The concern should be up north, where their voices have never been heard. CBC does not go up there. CTV would not go up there, and Global does not go up north to tell indigenous, Inuit stories. It is too expensive. However, here we have Netflix and Amazon giving us the stories of Canadian people. TV and film production is at its all-time high in this country.

We were told in committee by the largest entertainment workers union, Unifor, that streamers are now the largest employer in this sector. No longer is it CTV, Global or CBC. It is the streamers that are the largest employer in the sector. We can see how it has grown.

I am a 40-plus year veteran of television. I have seen the decline in television, but the gap has been filled by streamers and production houses from others that had to come into this country to put money on the table to produce some of the greatest innovation this country has ever seen.

My fear now is that CanCon demands and higher regulatory costs would mean that many streaming services from around the world could block Canada. The biggest concern, and I have talked about this, is regulating user content. This was one of the eight Senate amendments rejected by the government. I pointed that out. It appears that the government wants to retain the power to regulate. Instead of listening to experts, the Liberals are catering to the needs of big telecom companies, which basically hold the monopoly, and they have for decades, over broadcasting in this country.

One more time, I am going to talk about the CRTC because I am fearful of it today. The CRTC, as we have seen, is a body with little or no accountability. I would argue it is one of the least effective regulatory bodies in the whole country today. It is a body that can barely handle the responsibilities that it has. For starters, the CRTC has been totally ineffective at managing Canadian telecoms. We have the least competitive and most expensive telecommunication industry in the world. I blame the CRTC. Canadians today pay the highest prices for cell phones and Internet. Many, in fact, do not even have broadband in this country.

Then there is that three-digit suicide prevention line, which this place unanimously voted for in December 2020. How easy would that be to put into action? The CRTC, in its wisdom, has taken a year and a half for a simple three-digit suicide prevention line. How can we expect the CRTC to address the problems of broadcasting when we already know it has no idea how to handle its responsibilities?

The big issue with Bill C-11 is the CRTC and the Governor in Council. Canadians have woken up. I have gotten lots of emails in the last couple of days. I can share them during questions and comments. This is a bill that Canadians should be very fearful of.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise again to speak to this bill. I spoke to Bill C-10 in the previous Parliament and I have spoken to Bill C-11 in this Parliament, and this debate around the Conservative amendment provides an opportunity to speak again.

I would like to start out by saying that Conservatives fancy themselves experts on all things to do with markets and the marketplace, but ironically they do not appear to understand markets. They do not seem to understand marketing distribution systems and networks, and the convergence of interests, big money interests, that occurs within these systems and networks.

In any market, big players, through their market power, can control distribution of product, physical or cultural. They can distort markets by deciding what consumers can have access to. It is an immutable law of the marketplace, as ironclad as the law of gravity itself, that the big players seek greater and greater market power, including through vertical integration. For example, distributors often seek to become producers of product. In the cultural sector, they seek to become producers of content. We see this with the big streaming services like Netflix and Amazon. In the case of Amazon, a company that was basically a mail-order house has also become a streaming service that does cross-marketing. When people order something on Amazon, they are asked if they want to subscribe to Amazon Prime.

Streaming services not only distribute content; they produce it more and more. It goes without saying that they have an interest in all of us being properly exposed to the content they produce at great cost. What is more, we see platforms like Google and Meta using their monopolistic muscle to intimidate duly elected governments, which I find unacceptable. This is whom the Conservatives are defending: the big streaming platforms, not the small, independent creators. They are sidling up to the big kids in the schoolyard. We are a long way from Adam Smith's free market of equals who bargain in the town square and achieve a fair equilibrium.

On the subject of algorithms, the bill is clear: The government cannot dictate algorithms to streaming platforms, end of story. The book is closed on that. In fact, it was never opened. Proposed subsection 9.1(8) of the bill reads, “The Commission shall not make an order under paragraph (1)‍(e) that would require the use of a specific computer algorithm or source code.” That is in black and white in the bill and has been since the very beginning, yet we keep hearing from the other side that somehow the government is trying to control algorithms. When members are characterizing what is in the bill as fake news, I find that very Trumpian. It is not fake news; it is fact, and it is fact in black and white in legislation.

There is also an assumption in the narrative of the official opposition that social media algorithms mean freedom, but algorithms are not the doorway to freedom. They can be straitjackets, straitjackets of the mind. They can be blinders. We know they can lock people in echo chambers that amplify their own ideological biases. Social media algorithms are not necessarily designed to expand one's horizon. On the contrary, they can be designed to narrow one's field of vision. They are myopic and can be used to promote specific economic and political interests. It can be through algorithms that biases are reinforced and, in some cases, that misinformation is given a high-octane boost.

Let us look at radio by way of analogy. Radio of the 1970s, when CanCon was introduced by a Liberal government, is not so different from streaming today, even though the Conservatives have tried to tell us that these are apples and oranges and cannot be compared. We can superimpose the Conservative position onto 1970s radio and see what would have happened if that argument, that ideology, had been applied to music on radio.

The opposition says that Bill C-11's discoverability features cannot be compared to CanCon, that they are night and day, apples and oranges. They argue that we needed CanCon when faced with the limited resource of radio frequencies and that this solution is no longer needed because the web is limitless and opportunities to be heard are infinite.

I agree about the web. It is an infinite ocean of limitless voices, large and small, and herein lies the contradiction in the Conservative narrative. How can there be censorship by governments, or anyone else for that matter, in the endless ocean that is the World Wide Web? It is an oxymoron to speak of censorship in the cyber-era, unless we are in North Korea, where Conservatives appear to think we live. Today's challenge is not censorship, but misinformation and disinformation amplified by bots and algorithms.

Let us go back to CanCon and radio. The reason we needed CanCon was to counter a powerful, U.S.-centric distribution system whose financial interests were not necessarily those of Canadian music creators. Without CanCon, radio stations would have played only music provided to them by multinational record companies with an interest in promoting the musical artists they invested in. How would radio stations have decided what songs to play from all the music supplied to them? Playlists would have been compiled according to listener requests, requests based on the music supplied by the record companies and played on the radio, and on record sales at record stores stocked with records also supplied by the same foreign-owned record companies.

In a sense, without a requirement for CanCon, which is a form of discoverability, the de facto music industry radio algorithm would not have left much space for great Canadian music.

Finally, the Conservatives say that if Canadian culture cannot make it on its own, without any kind of government support, then it should face the judgment of the marketplace. They seem to view Canadian culture as the latest automobile.

If the Conservatives are so vehemently opposed to government intervention, the support of culture, are they asking that we eliminate Telefilm and the Canadian film or video production tax credit, which support Canadian films, many of them award winners? I think that is one of the questions that need to be asked here.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is a great honour to rise tonight to speak to Bill C-11.

We have been around this issue a number of times. It is really important in this age of post truth, disinformation, falsehood and conspiracy that we actually say in Parliament what it is that we are debating and what the issues actually are. One would think this is a place where the precepts of truth are supposed to hold to some kind of standard but unfortunately they do not.

Bill C-11 is fundamentally about making sure that some of the most powerful corporations in the world, the web giants, actually pay a fair share of tax and level the playing field with Canadian broadcasters that are unable to compete, given the huge advantages that have been taken and appropriated by some of the media giants that have emerged out of Silicon Valley. For example, we can look at Netflix and how Disney moved online and took up a huge role of broadcasting, which is fine because industry changes. However, they are not paying nearly the level of tax in Canada for services they provide in Canada, which puts other Canadian operations at a disadvantage. They have also not been willing to pay into the system that has existed in Canada for years and has created an ecosystem of arts, culture and identity: the media fund. This is about levelling the playing field.

This bill is not about spying on one's grandmother's Internet. It is not, as I have heard Conservatives say, allowing the son of Pierre Elliott Trudeau to block one's YouTube views on how to fix one's deck. This is not about censorship and shutting down so-called free expression. This is about making sure that extremely powerful corporations pay their share, and we are going to talk about that tonight.

Some of this disinformation was certainly allowed in the previous bill, Bill C-10, because, I am sorry to say, the environment minister, who was then the heritage minister, had an inability to even explain what the bill was about. He created an absolute total dumpster fire and got people rightly upset because he could not explain the difference between corporate content and user-generated content. What exactly was in the bill? He did not seem to know. It left the arts community and everyone else having to do damage control.

Bill C-11, I would say, is an okay bill. It is not a great bill. However, as a legislator, one of the great honours of my career has been to work with parliamentarians from around the world on the need to address the unprecedented power of Silicon Valley and to make it obligated to respect domestic jurisdiction. Its complete disregard for domestic jurisdiction is a serious issue.

In 2018, when I was on the ethics committee and the Canadian delegation of parliamentarians went to London for the first international grand committee, I believed that the Canadian delegation was out front because the Conservatives, the Liberals and the New Democrats were working together. We understood the need to take on the disinformation. The threat to democracy was such a serious element that it was beyond partisanship. What I have seen in my international meetings is that the need to hold companies like YouTube and Facebook to meet domestic obligations is something that should normally be beyond partisan consideration, but that is not what has happened under Bill C-11.

We met with parliamentarians from Brazil who told us about the shocking rise of Bolsonaro, who was a complete marginal extremist. They told us about how he used the YouTube algorithms to drive his ascendancy, which has created a political toxic nightmare in Brazil. We met with representatives from the global south who attempted time and time again to deal with Facebook and YouTube on toxic disinformation that led to genocidal levels of death in Myanmar and Sri Lanka. We met with delegations from Singapore on their attempts to get these Silicon Valley companies to take responsibility for the hate that was being perpetrated.

Today, the member for Lethbridge, in one of the most dismal, disgraceful speeches I have ever heard in my 19 years, presented a complete falsehood and talked about this magical thing called the Internet. This is not 2004. This is 2023, when this so-called magical thing called the Internet in Myanmar replaced all the domestic media and was used to promote violent, hateful genocide that left thousands and thousands and thousands of people dead. We had the representative from Facebook come to our committee, and I asked them a simple question about the corporate responsibility for genocide. The answer we got was the classic Silicon Valley jargon bunk: Nobody is perfect and we are all on a journey together. We are not on a journey together when corporate irresponsibility leads to genocide.

This is not about my opinion. This was the United Nations begging Facebook to take responsibility because it was the only broadcaster. It was the same thing in Sri Lanka. It was the same thing in Germany, where we can track the rise of anti-refugee violence to the algorithms of Facebook and YouTube. What we never heard from the Conservatives in their attack on Bill C-11 is anything about the algorithms.

Again, I want to refer to my colleague from Lethbridge and the toxic brew of paranoia, disinformation and hate that was promoted. I have read the legislation, and the member said that Bill C-11 was going to allow the cabinet, the Liberals and the son of Pierre Elliott Trudeau to spy on people's search pages. That is a falsehood. To say that Bill C-11 would allow the Liberals, the cabinet and the son of Pierre Elliott Trudeau to watch someone's Facebook scrolling is a deliberate falsehood. That has nothing to do with how Facebook or YouTube works and the algorithms that drive people to extremism. The member said that this bill would allow the cabinet, the Liberals, the elite gatekeepers, the son of Pierre Elliott Trudeau and the big arts union bosses, whom she also threw in, to block people's ability to watch cat videos. That was said in the House of Commons.

I raise that because there is a lot of synthetic outrage we hear. That is part of the job. People jump up and down and declare all kinds of calumny toward the government. I have certainly declared all kinds of malice toward government over the years. However, we are in an age of disinformation and paranoia, and we are talking about the need for parliamentarians to rise above that and not feed it for mendacious political purposes. This is an important issue because we see in 2023 the rise of conspiracy politics, and the new leader of the Conservative Party thinks it is working in his favour.

When the member for Lethbridge says that if this bill is passed, it will make the leader of Canada powerful like the dictator of North Korea, not only is that a falsehood, but it is a disgrace to anyone who suffers under authoritarian regimes. It needs to be called out because we are at a point where 44% of the Canadian public believes conspiracy theories. That is being fed by the Conservatives, who believe that this will somehow get them an advantage in polling. It is a very dangerous path to go down.

We have only to look, for example, at the new shadow minister for infrastructure, who has used her time in the House to promote disinformation about Bill Gates, a classic trope of conspiracy theorists, and vaccines, which is another conspiracy misinformation drive. To her, Bill Gates and vaccines are undermining Canadian sovereignty, and she is accusing the Prime Minister. This is a person appointed as a shadow minister in the Conservative shadow cabinet. It is therefore not surprising that when Christine Anderson, a far-right German neo-Nazi extremist, came to Canada, she was feted and welcomed by key members of the Conservative caucus. They felt at home with that spread of disinformation.

This is not harmless stuff. A report that just came out on vaccine disinformation said that Canada had 198,000 extra cases of COVID, 13,000 more people sent to hospital and a $300-million hit to the medical system from people who were encouraged to believe in vaccine disinformation. An extra 2,800 people died as a result. That is double all the car accidents in Canada for a year.

These people were not isolated weirdos. They were our cousins, our neighbours and our aunts. When we see the Conservatives promoting vaccine disinformation because they think it is going to win them votes, we have to ask ourselves what is happening in our nation today that the political representatives of the people are not telling people that medical science is working with us. We did not have all the answers on the vaccines. We did not have all the answers on dealing with the biggest pandemic in a century. However, we all had an obligation to stand up and say that threatening and attacking doctors, nurses and paramedics is unacceptable. That is the danger of disinformation.

It not as though this pattern comes out of nowhere, because we know what happened in Brazil with the Zika virus. There was suddenly a proliferation of falsehood videos on YouTube that told mothers it was feminists making their children sick, that it was George Soros who was making their children sick. However, there were doctors and nurses on the front lines trying to stop that pandemic, and we saw the disinformation.

Why does that disinformation need to be talked about? We have never heard the Conservative caucus talk about holding the algorithms to account, but it is the algorithms that have created toxic disinformation. They are upending democratic engagement. The Conservatives talk about freedom, the freedom to believe in ivermectin and horse tranquillizers. We have heard Conservative leadership candidates brag about how great ivermectin is. They can believe whatever they want, but the issue is that this is about how the algorithms on Facebook and YouTube turn people toward disinformation.

I urge my colleagues to read the book The Chaos Machine. As they will see in it, when people started to study vaccine disinformation in 2013 and 2014, there were parent groups talking about raising their children, but the only ones that were promoted on the algorithm promoted disinformation. If someone clicked on one of those, soon after the algorithm would feed them more and more extremist content.

By the time the pandemic hit, I had joined an international group of parliamentarians led by Damian Collins from the U.K. We thought we could actually stay ahead of disinformation. We thought we could challenge it and take it on. However, within a month it was clear that the game was over. During the pandemic, if someone checked anything on Facebook while asking for the query “alternate health” in Facebook's search function, it sent them to QAnon. That is how the algorithm works.

The algorithms are set to send people to extremism, but we do not hear that when the Conservatives talk about Bill C-11. They are trying to make Canadians believe this is some kind of plot so that the big Liberal elites, their gatekeepers and their big arts bosses can attack our rights, spy on us and shut down our views.

In fairness, I know some of the Conservatives believe this. I firmly believe that some of them, in their hearts, do believe in the Klaus Schwab and George Soros tin hat conspiracy theory. However, I also know there is an element in the Conservative Party that thinks this is a great idea and that they should spread the hate and disinformation, because it will keep people angry and it will get them to vote against the other government. They do not come here with a vision of how to address the mass power of the web giants, which other jurisdictions are dealing with. They do not come here to ask how we ensure a balance of rights and freedoms and how we ensure local content.

I am not going to be the one to say let us give extra money to Postmedia or any of the other historic companies, but what is the obligation of companies to pay their share? That is a fair discussion and that is what we should be discussing, but it is not what this has been turned into. It is about the Conservative push to promote disinformation, falsehoods and ridiculous statements. The only thing I have not heard about from the Conservatives is “pizzagate”. That is about the only thing they have not mentioned. They have mentioned everything else but that.

When I go back to international forums with parliamentarians from France, Germany, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Brazil, who are asking what Canada is doing about disinformation, I will say there is a mixed bag. We recognize the damage disinformation is doing, that it costs lives, that it is creating paranoia and that there has been a rise in death threats against doctors, nurses, paramedics and people in political life for daring to speak up. It was the member for Oshawa who used his position in the House of Commons to promote the falsehood that the Prime Minister was somehow working for Klaus Schwab. When I took that on, within an hour I was attacked and received threats.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I humbly rise today following my wonderful colleague from Berthier—Maskinongé's speech about this bill, which is important for Quebec culture and is central to the very mission of the Bloc Québécois. I would also like to commend my colleague from Drummond for his superb work on this file.

Broadcasting is without a doubt the most effective tool for spreading culture, and it helps define our national identity. Given the rapid development of information and communication technologies, the Bloc Québécois obviously supports the idea of modernizing the Broadcasting Act, which has not been updated since 1991. Back then, I was still listening to music on cassette on my yellow Walkman, and I was only just beginning to take an interest in CDs. I had scarcely even heard of the Internet. The Bloc Québécois contributed substantially to improving the previous version of this bill, the infamous Bill C-10.

I will briefly address the new version, Bill C-11, in my speech. First, I will talk about protecting and promoting original French-language content. I will then discuss the misinformation circulating about the bill. I will conclude by discussing the importance of the bill for local media.

First, let me mention a few crucial aspects regarding the protection and promotion of original French-language content: the discoverability of Canadian programming services and original Canadian content so that there is more original French-language content, proportionally speaking; the promotion of Canadian programming in both official languages, as well as in indigenous languages; a compulsory contribution to the Canadian broadcasting system should a company be unable to use Canadian resources for its programming; the presence of first-run French-language content in order to ensure that platforms like Netflix have new French-language programs, not only old shows; and a sunset clause ensuring an in-depth review of the act every five years.

The Minister of Canadian Heritage promised us that the Bloc Québécois's amendments would be included in the new version of the reform, and indeed they are almost all there. Since nothing can be left to chance in such a bill, we are making sure that we can course correct in the event that changing one simple word has a major impact on the effect of the clause. We have to keep in mind that we want a piece of legislation that will not be obsolete as soon as it is passed. Technology is developing very quickly, and we need a long-term vision to ensure that the act does not become outdated after just a few years. Flexible legislation is important.

From day one, the Bloc, backed by Quebec's entire cultural sector, was the party that worked the hardest on improving Bill C‑10 and getting it passed before the end of the parliamentary session. During the last election campaign, making sure that Bill C‑10, now Bill C‑11, was passed was even the first item on our election platform under arts, culture and heritage. Quebec's and Canada's cultural sectors have been waiting for decades for this act to be updated. The cultural sector made a simple demand just a few days after Bill C‑11 was introduced. It asked us to ensure that this bill passed quickly, because the sector had waited long enough.

Essentially, the objective of the bill remains the same: to apply the Broadcasting Act to the web giants by forcing them to contribute financially to the creation and discoverability of Canadian cultural content. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, or CRTC, will receive new powers that will allow it to determine which online services will have to be regulated and what quotas will need to be met.

Bill C‑11 will help better regulate video streamers such as Netflix, Apple TV+, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video, but also companies that specialize in streaming music online such as Spotify, YouTube and Apple Music. Bill C‑11 will require these companies to contribute to Canadian content when commercial items such as albums are downloaded and distributed on their platforms.

The exclusion clause, namely clause 4.1, addressed earlier, has been revised. Now creators, users and social media influencers are exempt from the legislation. It still needs to be taken into account. The money a creator earns from their content is immaterial in the eyes of the new legislation. So-called amateur content on social media would be exempt. The legislation focuses specifically on commercial products.

The CRTC will also have the option to impose conditions associated with discoverability and the development of Canadian content. The bill will not touch the algorithms that can influence the recommendations made to users. The department says it wants to focus instead on discoverability outcomes and not intervene directly with respect to web giants' algorithms. Quebec, francophone and Canadian content must be much more accessible on platforms. Ottawa is trying to give the CRTC the power to hold discussions with each of the digital companies to determine how much they could contribute to Canadian content based on their business model.

Second, I would remind members that the Liberals, the NDP and the Bloc supported and tried to improve this bill that the Conservatives were against from the outset. They engaged in a smear campaign and tried to find all kinds of far-fetched flaws. They really used their imagination. In Parliament, they used a variety of stratagems to slow down the process, both in committee and in the House. They took the House hostage under false pretenses, claiming that the bill infringes on freedom of expression.

However, since 1991, there has been a provision that forces the CRTC to respect freedom of expression. This provision has always been respected, and there is nothing to indicate that that will change. Pierre Trudel, a law professor at Université de Montréal who is an expert on the CRTC and information technologies, reassured us of that. He categorically stated that the freedom of Internet users is not at risk. There is no thought police on television, and there will be no thought police online.

Given the popularity and growing use of online platforms, there is no doubt that the legislation needs to be reviewed. According to ADISQ statistics on the music consumption habits of Quebec francophones over the age of 15, 50% of users follow YouTube's recommendations when choosing their playlists. When it comes to streaming services, 26% of users choose music suggested by the platform through playlists, and 17% follow recommendations. This is based on their past listening habits. These figures illustrate the importance of making Quebec and Canadian francophone content easily discoverable to users on online platforms in order to give it a boost.

Solutions do exist to address the algorithms. One option to consider would be for Spotify and Apple Music to offer a lot more francophone playlists.

Part of the CRTC's mission is to ensure the proper functioning and development of the Canadian broadcasting system. In doing so, it must respect freedom of expression and the other foundations of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Third, both Quebec's and Canada's broadcasting industries are in crisis. According to an August 2020 report from the Canadian Association of Broadcasters, or CAB, local television and radio broadcasters were projected to face a revenue shortfall totalling $1.6 billion between 2020 and 2022. According to the CAB, 50 radio stations were at risk of shutting down within four to six months of the report's release, and another 150 could go silent within 18 months, resulting in 2,000 job losses, or 24% of 2019 employment levels. The report added that at least 40 of the 95 private and local television stations in Canada would cease operations by 2023.

The most vulnerable operations are AM stations, independent stations and other private radio and TV stations in smaller markets across Canada. Radio and television revenues have been declining for several years, and COVID-19 exacerbated these disconcerting trends.

We know that the Internet has revolutionized the way Quebeckers, particularly young Quebeckers, consume their favourite TV shows, movies, radio stations and music. Consumption trends have drastically changed. The online broadcasting market is dominated by foreign players. We need to take that into account.

Young Quebeckers are especially likely to skirt the traditional broadcasting system. The vast majority of young francophones aged 15 and up frequently listen to music on YouTube. We therefore need to ensure that they are offered francophone content.

A study conducted by CEFRIO, a research and innovation organization, found that over eight in 10 Quebeckers used a social media site in 2018, an increase of 16% compared to 2016. It is clear that the Internet is changing usage and listening habits.

Since I have only about a minute left, I just want to give a few statistics from the Canadian Audio-Visual Certification Office. Canadian content production decreased by an average of 12.4% per year between January 2017 and December 2020. It is important to remember that media outlets are currently in crisis, mainly because they have lost their advertising revenue to web giants.

In conclusion, the Yale report was clear: Canadian content is important. It said that if we do not tell our own stories, no one else will. That really made an impression on me. That was why the report set out a suite of recommendations on financing Canadian content with public funds, imposing spending requirements on foreign online broadcasters, and strengthening CBC/Radio-Canada.

One last thing before I wrap up: Last night, I met with Martin Gougeon from the Théâtre de l'Ancien presbytère. He is an artist who has made it his mission to promote our francophone culture to young students. I have also met with local media representatives many times. They are all unanimous. Quebec's cultural and media communities want this. Let us pass Bill C‑11. Enough dawdling.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first, I would like to say I will be sharing my time with my very distinguished and dynamic colleague from Shefford.

Let me make a few things clear. Bill C-11 deals with culture, not censorship. Bill C-11 deals with national identity and pride. Culture is the essence of who we are. This bill does not promote censorship, it promotes and showcases our culture. I would even say that it seeks to showcase our cultures: Canadian culture, Quebec culture and indigenous cultures.

The bill seeks to give more visibility to culture. This is not about telling people they can no longer listen to certain content. Since the beginning of the debate today, we have been hearing all sorts of things. In fact, we have been hearing these things for two years, since Bill C-11 is the former Bill C-10. We hear things about cat videos, for example. Let us be serious.

The threat does not come from censorship because of Bill C-11. The threat comes from the platforms that have changed the world of telecommunications. That is the threat.

We are working on Bill C-11 to review an act that was amended for the last time in 1991. Must I remind you that, in 1991, we did not all have cellphones in our pockets? It was a completely different world, which is why we need to review the act.

The cultural community is asking for this, as is everyone else. We are not just being asked to pass the bill quickly. Quebec’s cultural community is asking us to hurry because it needs this legislation. They are losing $70 billion a week. On reflection, that may be a bit high. I will have to check the figures later in my notes. Let us say that, every week we delay the passage of this bill, they are losing a lot of money. Let us protect our people.

What does Bill C-11 do? It ensures the protection and promotion of original content. For us, that means French-language content, which is what concerns us. Of course, it also ensures the protection and promotion of original Canadian productions in English and indigenous languages and productions created by certain visible minorities. If we want to protect Canadian content and boost visibility, we need to bring in incentives. We are not talking about banning people from posting on Facebook and saying what they want. This is not about imposing choices, it is about raising their visibility. It is about ensuring discoverability.

Let us consider how small the percentage of French-language production in North America is. If we rely only on the number of times videos are viewed by users, French-language content will not be suggested very often. That is the problem. It is not about playing with algorithms. It is about giving the CRTC the power to talk to these companies and see what they can do to give local culture more visibility. It is a matter of promoting and showcasing our culture.

Let me draw a parallel here. When we look at platforms, we see that there is very little French-language content and that needs to be fixed. When we look at the boards of directors of Canadian and Quebec companies, we see that women are under-represented. In both cases, we need to take action to fix the situation. Obviously, we do not want to prevent anyone from applying, but we want to make sure that the positions are accessible to women and that women receive those kinds of job offers. The same thing applies to culture.

With Bill C-11, we want to improve the visibility, and therefore the profitability, of our local French-language productions and put in place a mandatory contribution to the Canadian and Quebec broadcasting system.

A mandatory contribution is more than just running old television shows. We want the platforms to participate in the creation of real local content. An American movie filmed in Vancouver is not local content. We certainly benefit when American filmmakers shoot in Vancouver. We support that. However, local content is something local produced by local artists who represent us. That is what culture is.

When racialized people say that they watch television and do not see themselves, that is a problem. These people should be able to see themselves and identify with the characters. That is why we are trying to increase representativeness. It is the same thing.

We simply want to expand the coverage of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, or CRTC, to all media we interact with. We need first-run French-language content.

With this bill, we are telling the major American platforms that stream content in Canada and invade our markets that we are relatively happy because that is a good way to disseminate information, it gives more people greater access to information. Furthermore, streaming does not restrict access to cat videos; then again, it invades our market. That is where we have the right to say, as a state, that we have a culture to protect.

I often talk about the agricultural exemption in the House. This morning, I talked about the agricultural exemption. We cannot act without protecting our culture. It is important. We have the right to tell the people who come and make money in Canada that we are happy to welcome them and that it is a good thing, just as we have the right to tell them that we would like to recognize ourselves in our media. We are not asking them to ban certain content, but to showcase local productions that represent our people. That is the idea.

There is another very positive element in Bill C-11. It makes no sense that, in 2023, we are revising a broadcasting act from 1991. That is a major oversight.

The bill includes the obligation to review the act at least every five years. To those who have concerns, I would say that we are capable of being intelligent and implementing a reasonable policy. After the law is in effect for a few years, we will review it all to see how things went and what the impacts were. That is the important part.

I want to spend the last few minutes of my speech emphasizing that the Quebec and Canadian cultural community wholeheartedly supports Bill C‑11.

I just found the figure that I mentioned earlier. I should have said “millions” rather than “billions”. I thought that seemed like a lot. According to the former Canadian heritage minister, we would lose $70 million every month. I do not know whether those numbers were validated, but I am assuming that they were.

This important bill is one of three related and highly anticipated bills in this Parliament. As parliamentarians, I would like us to quickly pass them. There was Bill C‑11 to promote our local content. There is also Bill C‑18, which will complement it. Communications platforms will pay something to use news content in order to encourage our journalistic community. That is important. Finally, there is a third bill on online hate, which we need to regulate.

Once again, this is not about censorship, but about living together, being reasonable and creating a world where the Internet is a bit more representative of who we are. We need to see ourselves on television every once in a while, see ourselves reflected in the programming so that we do not forget who we are. I said television, but it is the same thing for the things we watch on a computer screen.

Let us stop wasting time and pass this essential bill.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the fact of the matter is that, with Bill C-11, those who enjoy online streaming platforms such as Netflix or Disney+, or videos on a platform such as YouTube, or maybe even just scrolling through Facebook looking at people's pages, these individuals would be impacted in the kind of content they could access and watch. Bill C-11 would determine the type of information that is put in front of them. Bill C-11 would determine the content that is put in front of our eyeballs.

When I say by Bill C-11, what I mean is that, according to clause 7 of the bill, it would be cabinet who could determine, through the CRTC, what Canadians can see, post or hear online. Again, it would be cabinet, based on clause 7, who would be given that authority. That is scary. It is scary for any government in power because it would mean that cabinet, which is partisan, would be directing what we can see, say or post online. Instead of giving a viewer more of what they want, YouTube would be instructed to give more of what the government wants. Again, this is very scary for most Canadians.

The government will claim, as the hon. member just before me did, that this bill is about supporting Canadian culture or levelling the playing field, but that is not true. Bill C-11 would amend the Broadcasting Act by bringing the Internet under its provisions.

In order to understand the effect of this, we need to understand why the Broadcasting Act was put in place in the first place. In the early 20th century, the Broadcasting Act was put in place to regulate TV and radio because those are finite commodities. There are only a certain number of radio stations or TV stations, so in order to make sure both official languages were represented within these platforms, the government determined they should be regulated so French language and culture would be protected and would be given space within these spheres.

Further to that, there was a definition given to Canadian content. We call it CanCon. There was this determination that a certain percentage of the content would be Canadian, or CanCon. The goal was to protect our culture, to make sure not only that it was American content making its way to Canada but also that Canadian content, things produced here, and there is a whole host of other criteria used, would be given space.

That is within the realm of TV and radio, which is limited, but now we are dealing with a space that is infinite, that is unlimited, which is the Internet. Anybody who wants a website can have a website, no matter their language of choice. Anybody who wants to have a YouTube channel can have a YouTube channel. Anybody who wants to have a space within TikTok, Instagram, etc. can have a space. We are no longer dealing with a finite resource.

The government does not need to regulate what content should be prioritized and what content should not be because we are no longer dealing with limitations. There is space for everyone.

I would plead with the government to perhaps look back on the record of what former prime minister Jean Chrétien had to say to this. In 1999, he faced a similar question about the Internet and whether it should be regulated. After undergoing a thorough investigation and a public inquiry, the determination was made that it should not be. He determined the Internet was so different than TV and radio that to treat it the same would actually stifle progress. After numerous public consultations, because there have been many done since Chrétien, here we are willing to function in a regressive way rather than maintaining the progressive stance that was taken by Jean Chrétien.

I will read what the directive stated in 1999. It said, “The commission [the CRTC] expects that the exemption of these services [Internet] will enable continued growth and development of the new media industries in Canada, thereby contributing to the achievement of the broadcasting policy objectives, including access to these services by Canadians.”

In other words, the determination was made that the Internet would not within the scope of the Broadcasting Act and that it would not be regulated. The reason for that was because there was a belief that innovation, advancement and growth would take place if it were left alone. There was a belief that that opportunity would be seized by all sorts of people from all sorts of regions with all sorts of backgrounds and different linguistic ways.

I would invite the government to consider its regressive stance and pull this legislation. On the Internet, everyone has a spot to showcase their talent. On the Internet, every single individual in this country has an opportunity to thrive, should they wish to.

Most people in this country have a smart device. One needs nothing more than that to showcase talent and make a name for oneself. The gatekeepers have been removed. In fact, it has never been easier for Canadians to succeed. It has never been easier for creators from a variety of linguistic and cultural backgrounds to reach not just a Canadian audience but a global audience as well.

For this legislation to build walls around these individuals and keep them hemmed in within Canada is so egregious that it is hard for one to even fathom the reason for such legislation. Why would we punish our young creators? Why would we punish the next media content creators? Why would we insist that a regressive form must be kept and that progress should not be celebrated? It baffles me, but I am not the only one. It baffles Canadians from coast to coast, whether it is legal experts speaking out on this topic, digital-first creators speaking out or Canadian consumers who simply want a choice.

The fact is that the gatekeepers have been removed. A creator used to have to put together a pitch or a package and bring it to a gatekeeper, such as CBC, Corus Entertainment, Bell Media or Rogers, and they would have to plead with them to accept their package, to accept their idea and to accept their creativity. That used to be the way it was done.

With the Internet, we have now entered this magical space where creators, innovators and thought leaders get to put their content out there and allow the Canadian people themselves to determine whether they like it or not, whether they want to watch it or not. We have removed the gatekeepers. It is incredible.

Instead of celebrating how amazing that is, the government is hell-bent on putting legislation in place to make sure that we maintain these old, antiquated ways. Why is that? Is the very nature of the arts not something that should propel us into the future? It it not something that should have forward momentum? Is it not something that should be creative and innovative in nature? Is that not the whole point of the arts? Why would we hem these individuals in?

For the minister to say that this bill somehow modernizes the Broadcasting Act is incredibly disingenuous, as I have laid out. The minister is failing to account for the tremendous progress that has been made and the creativity that has been allowed to flow.

For example, let us take Justin Bieber. He went big in approximately 2013. The way he went big was because he put out a few songs on YouTube and he got discovered. He did not have to put together a big media package, though he could have. He did not have to depend on gatekeepers to either accept him or reject him. instead, he could put his talent out there. His talent was discovered, and we know that he went big. He is a Canadian artist we are proud of.

There are many more like him who are aspiring. By putting a bill like this in place, by putting Bill C-11 in place, we are saying to the new generation not to bother. We want to subject that next generation to the same rules that we subjected artists to in the 1970s. Forget progress. If one wants to engage in progress, perhaps one should consider moving to the United States of America, South Korea or the U.K., but in Canada Bill C-11 puts this massive banner up that says we are opposed to innovation, progress and celebrating artists.

Bill C-11 ultimately will do two things. First, it will censor what we can see online because the government will dictate the content that is there. Second, Bill C-11 would determine the extent to which creators are allowed to thrive. In other words, the government will go through and pick winners and losers. Some content creators will be deemed Canadian enough and other content creators will not make the cut. If they make the cut, they will be promoted. If they do not make cut, they will not be promoted.

There is nothing progressive about censorship. That is exactly what this bill is about. It is about censoring Canadians and what they can see, what they can hear and what they can post online. It is about censoring artists, whether they have access to an audience and to what extent that access is granted.

When speaking about this bill, Margaret Atwood, who is an extremely well-known Canadian author, did not mince her words. She was pretty direct about it. She called it “creeping totalitarianism”, which is pretty damning. Those are not my words, but Margaret Atwood's.

To understand this a little bit more, we have to go back to the origin. We have to go back to the origin of this bill. We have to talk about the motive because I think that is very important for Canadians to understand.

This bill, we know, started out as Bill C-10 in 2020. It has gone through a number of iterations since then, but the worst parts of this bill remain intact. In fact, one could argue that it is actually worse than ever, in part because it has had opportunity to change. The government had an opportunity to hear from witnesses. The government had an opportunity to hear from experts, and the government made a decision to ignore those voices. The government has had an opportunity to respond to the Senate amendments, which were very thoughtful and reasonable, and the government is making the decision to disregard most of those amendments. One could argue then that the government is actually wanting this bill to be as egregious as possible.

What brought us here anyway? Why is the government so hell-bent on Bill C-11 going through the way that it is? The evidence would say it is because of broadcasters wanting to maintain power and wanting to hold money. There are these large broadcasters, CBC, Bell, Corus Entertainment, etc., and they are limited by CanCon rules. A certain percentage of the content shown on their traditional streaming platforms has to be Canadian content.

Of course, this acts as a limitation to them. Those are their words. That is what they have said. They do not view that as an opportunity to show more Canadian content. They testified at committee that they view it as a limitation because they are limited. They have to show a certain percentage of Canadian content, CanCon. They say these other streaming companies should have to do the same because they want it to be the same. Further to that, these broadcasters have to pay a certain percentage into an art fund. This art fund can then be drawn from by Canadian artists who are producing CanCon and used for that material production.

Because these traditional broadcasters have to pay into this fund and the larger streamers do not, the broadcasters went knocking on the Liberals' door and said they wanted legislation to be brought into place to “level the playing field”. They wanted the Liberals to go after the streaming platforms, make sure they are showing a certain percentage of Canadian content and make sure the government is taking a certain percentage of their revenue and putting it into the art fund.

At first glance, that might seem reasonable, except that when we dig into it further, we realize the broadcasters and the big art unions are simply gatekeeping. They do not want to celebrate progress. They do not want to look forward to the future. They do not want new artists to succeed. They simply want to gatekeep. They want control or power, and they want money.

I want to talk about the foundation on which the bill is built, because it is a false foundation and it has to do with those who came knocking on the Liberals' door for the legislation. The bill is based on the deceptive notion that Canadian content creators or artists cannot make it on their own merit and that somehow they need this special fund in order to make a go of it. YouTubers, TikTokers and other online creators are proving this notion wrong each and every day. They are succeeding without drawing from the art fund. They are succeeding without the government mandating that Canadian content must be watched. They are succeeding because they have incredible talent to watch and incredible talent to offer, and Canadians find themselves drawn to it.

There is the idea, though, that, in order to succeed as artists in Canada, people need monetary support and that it is the government that should provide this monetary support. Furthermore, there is other misinformation being spread by the government, which is that people will not choose Canadian content unless it is forced in front of their eyeballs, and that a certain percentage of what is offered on television, radio or the Internet must be Canadian, or people will not watch it. How degrading is that? It is as if our artists do not have the ability on their own to produce content that people might want to consume. It is as if the government must rush in and rescue these poor Canadian artists because, without government intervention, they will not succeed. That is a lie and a crux. It is not the case.

Canadian artists are incredibly talented individuals who can make a go of it all on their own.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

Madam Chair, I'll be very quick.

I would like this to come to committee. We have seen the concerns out of Quebec. I've been with Bill C-10 and Bill C-11 for over two years. I would love one more shot at coming back here to look at the eight amendments that were turned down by the Liberals in the Senate. I would like to have one last look at it.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Madam Chair, I am very happy to see you. This is the first time I have had the privilege of serving on this committee, which you chair so well. I am here today replacing the member for Lethbridge, Ms. Thomas.

As permitted and required by Standing Order 108(2), I am tabling the motion of which Ms. Thomas gave notice over a month ago. I will read it:

That, given that

(a) the Senate made substantial amendments to Bill C-11, the Online Streaming Act and has returned the Bill to the House, and

(b) the Government will be preparing their response to those amendments imminently,

the committee immediately undertake a study of the subject matter of the Senate amendments to Bill C-11 and report their recommendations to the House.

We are tabling this motion because we are well aware that Bill C‑11, which is under the purview of this parliamentary committee, has been hotly debated for a very long time. Let's remember that in other times, a few years ago, this bill was number C‑10. The current government decided at that time to call an election, which we all remember cost $620 million, to achieve a result that was pretty much exactly the same as before. At the end of the day, we lost months and months of work.

The fact remains that this is the reality and we have to deal with it. This bill, as we know, is a major one. It is about the Broadcasting Act and it is about refreshing a long-standing piece of legislation and dealing with the challenges of the 21st century, the year 2023 in particular, and other years.

This major bill therefore deserves major work. That is why the Senate has debated it and been concerned about it. As we know, our political party has no control over what happens in the Senate. However, the senators, true to their reputation and obligations, have done a studious job and decided to table several amendments, which of course must be examined. As expected, our job as parliamentarians will be to determine what is good and what is not in these amendments. This is not a minor matter.

What we are talking about is the future of Internet and the future of radiodiffusion in this country. This is why we have to be very serious in our study. The senators have done their job directly and well. Sometimes we agree and sometimes we disagree, but they have done what they are supposed to do, and they have done it well. If we want to be serious on this bill, we have to hear what they have to say and look at what they have adopted.

We have also given notice of this motion, which allows some latitude, as you will have noticed.

In the last few weeks something has happened that is not trivial. I'm a Quebec fellow and I'm the member of Parliament for Louis-Saint-Laurent. Of course, what happens under provincial authority in the capital of Quebec has an impact on us. Since we are concerned, we feel that it is the duty of the 78 members from Quebec and the 338 members of the House of Commons to take note of the fact that a provincial assembly is taking a position on a bill debated in the House of Commons and the Senate, the two houses of the Canadian Parliament.

Thus, on February 4, the Honourable Minister of Culture and Communications of the Government of Quebec requested that the federal government take into account and acknowledge Quebec's wish to express its views on this: the possible ability that the government has given itself in clause 7 of the bill to directly guide the choices of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission. The Government of Quebec wishes to speak out on this matter.

We believe that when a provincial executive takes a step in this direction, it is our duty as parliamentarians to take it seriously. Let us recall that, a few days after this letter was sent, the 125 members of the National Assembly of Quebec unanimously adopted a motion asking for exactly the same thing: that the will of Quebec be respected and that Quebec have a say in this matter, since, as we know, Quebec is the home of the French fact in America.

In view of the fact that the provincial executive, that is to say the government, and the provincial legislature have asked with one voice that Quebec be allowed to have a say in this bill, it is quite clear that this request is legitimate. I would remind several of my co-workers that my colleague, the member for Charlesbourg-Haute-Saint-Charles, on more than one occasion, offered the Minister of Canadian Heritage the opportunity to give his point of view on this issue and on the request made by Quebec. We didn't ask for it just once, we asked for it twenty times.

That is why we want this motion to be adopted.

I would have much more to say, but my time is up.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Madam Speaker, we started with Bill C-10, which was definitely worse. I think what the member is referring back to are the concerns we were expressing at that time. Some of the changes that came in Bill C-11 reassured us, and one of those changes is the very one the Conservatives are harping on. That is the change that made sure that user-generated content is not affected by this bill.

What Conservatives are ignoring is that there is an exception. If those making their own content have a million subscribers and they are making money out of that, then, yes, the CRTC will have an ability to look at that. It is not what the Conservatives are saying, which is that we should have a blanket exemption that nobody who is making money on the Internet has to report to anybody or be accountable for anything. That was one of the major improvements between the first version of the bill and the bill that New Democrats are now supporting.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Madam Speaker, I would just like to put this to the member across the floor. The former Bill C-10, in its original version, included an exemption for programs that users upload onto their social media or, as it was called, user-generated content. The Liberals voted to take that out of their own bill in committee, which really builds confidence in Canadians, and resisted Conservative attempts to reintroduce it. They then put it back into Bill C-11, but then put in an exemption to the exemption that basically makes it meaningless. If Canadians are supposed to trust the government and believe what it is saying, this flies in the face of that.

Will the Liberals put that amendment back in and make it very clear to Canadians?

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am very happy to take part in this debate about how the Liberal government is taking excessive control over Canadians' choices.

Let us not fool ourselves. This bill gives way, way too much power to the federal government, which wants to impose its vision on the choices Canadians make when they use the Internet to watch movies and documentaries and enjoy Canadian culture.

The government wants to direct Canadians' choices by issuing orders to the CRTC. That is why we are fiercely opposed to this bill, which is a direct attack on people's freedom to choose whatever they want to see on digital platforms. We are not the only ones concerned about this. Many people who work in the industry are sounding the alarm. I will say more about that in a bit.

For now, let us concentrate on what has happened in recent years. We have been talking about this bill for years. Some people keep saying that this needs to get done fast, it is urgent, people want this bill and it is taking too long to pass it. We have been accused of filibustering.

The reality is that this bill has been delayed the most by the Liberal government itself. Previously, this bill was known as Bill C‑10, and it was introduced before the unnecessary election that cost $620 million in taxpayers' money. We had to carry out the study all over again.

I am prepared to listen to the comments of those accusing us of talking for the sake of talking and other such things. That is political rhetoric. However, the reality is that those who have delayed the debate and passage of this bill the most are not the Conservative members. It is the Liberal government, which triggered an election and even prorogued Parliament to avoid the WE Charity scandal. The election essentially changed nothing. The government spent $620 million of public money to change absolutely nothing, and this delayed debate of the bill, which, at the time, was known as Bill C‑10, and which is now Bill C‑11.

We are not the only ones in Quebec to have reservations about this bill. Indeed, the Quebec government wants to have its say on the bill. This is nothing new. Almost 11 months ago, on April 24, the Quebec government sent a letter to the Minister of Canadian Heritage informing him of Quebec's major concern about the unprecedented power that the federal government was giving itself under clause 7. This clause gives the executive branch, meaning government and cabinet, the power to give the CRTC directions to dictate what Canadians will be able to watch, by creating algorithms for browsing online platforms.

That is why the Quebec minister of culture and communications, Mathieu Lacombe, repeated that on February 4 in a letter in which he stated that it was “essential...that Quebec's cultural specificity and the unique reality of the French language market be adequately considered”, that “Quebec was the homeland of the French language and francophone culture in the Americas”, it was essential that it be heard. He also said that it was essential “to ensure that Quebec's legislative powers were recognized but that these conditions have not yet been met”.

The Quebec government raised its concerns last April. Following that letter, the National Assembly adopted a unanimous motion asking the federal government to let the Quebec government have its say in committee. The federal government did absolutely nothing. The minister received the letter and could barely be bothered to send an acknowledgment of receipt. After that, as I said last week in the House, he stuck it on his bedside table, under a pile of other papers, and did nothing about it for an entire year.

On February 4, 2023, Minister Lacombe got angry and sent the federal government another request, saying that time was up and that the Quebec government demanded to be heard. The Minister of Canadian Heritage did absolutely nothing.

It is not for lack of trying on our part. The hon. member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, our political lieutenant for Quebec, and I asked not two, not three, not four, but 20 questions to make it clear that Quebec wanted to be heard on the matter of this bill.

We asked 20 questions, and what did the Minister of Canadian Heritage do each time? He resorted to theatrics. He bragged and blustered, he gave a grandstanding response, but he offered nothing for Quebec.

It is scarcely surprising that the centralizing Liberal government should take this approach. I could spend days and days reminiscing about how this government and all previous Liberal governments were eager to commandeer the provinces' political powers. In fact, we are currently seeing how the government has made a specialty of sticking its big fat nose into provincial jurisidictions, where it does not belong.

It is not surprising that the government is doing that. However, it is disappointing to see the Bloc Québécois abetting this usurpation of ministerial responsibility and especially of Quebec's jurisdictions. These people get elected by saying that they speak for Quebec in the House of Commons and that they express the unanimous opinion of Quebeckers. They play up how important that is.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Madam Speaker, Bill C-11 is a piece of legislation that would impact every single Canadian who has a cellphone, a television or a computer in their home and who enjoys online streaming, viewing or listening to content that is online. That is how big this legislation is. That is how dramatic its impact would be. Permit me to provide an overview of what this legislation does, and then I will dive into the intricacies of the bill and hopefully explain why Canadians would be so impacted by it.

I am going to speak to Canadians. After all, the House is theirs and theirs alone.

Through this piece of legislation, the government is about to give itself the authority to control what Canadians have access to listen to online or to watch online. For example, instead of giving a viewer more of what they want on a platform such as YouTube, things would be ranked in a way that YouTube would be forced by the government to put things in front of us according to its definition of priority. It says it would be in accordance with how Canadian the content is. I will dive into that shortly.

YouTube would be forced to give more of what the government wants us to see, rather than more of what Canadians wish to see. This is problematic, because Canadians go online to access the things they are most passionate about or most interested in. They do not go online to have things pushed at them by the government. The government claims that the bill is about “supporting Canadian culture”. It says that it is about “levelling the playing field”. It is just not true.

Bill C-11 amends the Broadcasting Act by bringing the Internet under its provisions. In the early 20th century, the act was originally put in place to regulate TV and radio. It has gone through myriad iterations since then, but its result has always remained the same. It wants to ensure that Canada's two official languages are both respected by being given airtime and that cultural diversity is upheld. Those are noble goals. This was necessary because the number of TV and radio stations were limited. This finite resource needed to be managed. It needed to be overseen in order to ensure that the platforms were shared.

Unlike these two mediums, the Internet is boundless. In other words, anyone who wants to have a presence on the Internet can have one. The government does not need to regulate which content should be given priority and which content should be demoted, because there is space for all. The success of one individual or one creator online does not take away from the success of another. Everyone can achieve success.

If there was ever a level playing field, the Internet is it. Anyone who wants a website can set up a website. Anyone who wants a channel on YouTube can set one up. Anyone who wants to set up a TikTok account can have one. People have access to platforms within the online world that is boundless. It is quite incredible.

It could be argued that it has never been easier for Canadian content creators from all linguistic and cultural backgrounds to reach a global audience with the content they wish to showcase. If they wish to set up a YouTube channel, to set up a TikTok account or to be on Twitter, they can. The traditional gatekeepers have been removed.

Creators used to have to put together media package. Basically, it was like a portfolio of sorts that showed off their skill, their talent, their ability and what they wanted to produce. They would then walk it over to CBC, to Bell Media, to Rogers or to Corus Entertainment, and would have to beg them to accept their package and to put them on the air. If one or all of these gatekeepers said no, then they were out of luck. They do not deal with that anymore. Now creators can succeed based on their own merit, rather than based on what these gatekeepers desire for them.

Today's creators do not function according to the same rules as in previous generations. That is part of what is so difficult for some to accept. We exist in a new space and we have new ideals, freedom and choice being two of them.

For the minister to say that this bill would somehow modernize the Broadcasting Act and provide support to artists is actually incredibly disingenuous. The minister fails to account for progress. Instead of meeting artists where they are at, and celebrating the tremendous success that they enjoy within the realm of freedom, the government is actually wanting to pull them back under an antiquated system where their content would be weighed and measured and creators would be made into winners or losers, based on what the government wants rather than what Canadians want.

I wish for Canadians to know that this bill would impact them in two damning ways: One, it would censor what they see; and two, it would censor what they say. With regard to what they see, if the Canadian government determines what gets promoted and what gets demoted, then that means only certain content is made available to me as the viewer. In other words, it is censorship.

Furthermore, this bill would censor what an individual can say or post online. Homegrown talent and creative content here in Canada would no longer succeed based on merit, as they do now. Instead, as mentioned, content would be subject to a list of criteria and we do not actually know what that is because the government will not be transparent about it. Through that, the government would direct that these criteria have to be weighed and measured to see if they are met by the artist, and then if they are, it would be deemed Canadian and if they are not, then it would not be. If it is Canadian, it would be discoverable. In other words, it would be bumped up toward the top of our screen. However, if it is not made discoverable, it would get bumped down to maybe page 400, 500 or 600 where nobody looks. This bill is censorship. Not only would it censor what we can see as viewers, but it would also censor what can be posted online by creators and individual users.

Content creators from across Canada, along with consumer groups, have been speaking out about this bill. They are calling it dangerous. Legal experts have called it a grotesque overreach of government. When speaking about this bill, Margaret Atwood, a fabulous Canadian author who is very famous here, did not mince her words when she called it “creeping totalitarianism”.

I want to take a step back and say that there are two things that we can agree on. One, the Broadcasting Act should be updated; that is not what this bill would do. This bill would actually make the Broadcasting Act incredibly regressive, but anyway it should be updated. Two, Canada has a rich and beautiful culture and amazing artists; homegrown talent that absolutely we should look for a myriad of ways to promote and celebrate. How we do these things is where the disagreement comes into play. While the government claims that Bill C-11 is the best way forward, we would disagree. The best way forward is actually a path that preserves individual choice and opens doors to boundless opportunity. This bill would fail to do that.

It might serve us well to just take a pause and step back and figure out where this bill came from. This bill started out as Bill C-10 in 2020 and it has gone through a number of iterations since that time. However, one thing remains true about it: It is still a terrible piece of legislation. It is a terrible piece of legislation that would hinder what Canadians can see online and what they can post online. To put it simply, it would give the government control of our search bars. We think we are searching for one thing and that we will be directed in that way and in actuality, instead, based on algorithms that would be dictated by the government, we are actually sent to something different. That is what this bill would do.

What brought us here? What brought us to this bill's being put in place? There are two groups that are involved in that: the broadcasters and the traditional art unions or guilds. For the broadcasters, we have CBC, Bell and Corus media and they contribute a certain percentage to an art fund. A certain percentage of their revenue goes into that fund and then traditional artists are able to apply for some of that funding and use it for their projects.

Traditional broadcasters, of course, are less and less popular and are contributing fewer and fewer dollars, but they feel penalized by this, so they have gone knocking on the door of the government, saying they should not be the only ones contributing to the art fund, that the government should capture the large streamers as well. Further to that, these broadcasters have to show a certain percentage of their content as CanCon. CanCon does not always sell to their audiences all that well and so, to some extent, broadcasters feel hindered by this obligation. Again, they are watching as streaming platforms are not subject to this rule, so they have gone knocking on the government's door, saying it should really impose this rule on streamers as well.

Many artists are absolutely fabulous and should be celebrated and promoted. There are those traditional artists who belong to a union. They are not at fault, but the union bosses have knocked on the door of the government, saying because the revenues for traditional broadcasters are drying up, there is not as much money going into the art fund, they do not have as much available for their production of traditional art and, therefore, they want more money to be found somewhere, some way. The government then has said it could make the streamers responsible for contributing to the art fund, and so it is.

At the end of the day, Bill C-11 is all about maintaining status quo. It is about protecting the interests of large broadcasters. The government claims, however, that it is about forcing large streaming platforms, such as Netflix and Disney, to pay into a fund that supports Canadian artists and that it is about protecting Canadian culture or levelling the playing field.

If the implication of the bill stopped there, the reality is that would be bad enough, but it actually goes even further. It goes so far as to include user-generated content, the content of ordinary Canadians and the stuff that they put on platforms such as Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram. It does not stop at large foreign streamers. It absolutely captures individuals, Canadians. In fact, the former chair of the CRTC, Ian Scott, made this very clear at committee, not only in the House of Commons but then further at the Senate.

I will talk about this point more in just a moment, but I wish first to comment on the false foundation on which this bill is founded. First, this bill is based on the deceptive notion that Canadian content creators or artists cannot make it on their own merit. How degrading. This bill is based on the premise that they need government to step in and help them, but they are saying otherwise. This bill is based on the lie that the government needs to step in and also make sure that Canadian content is put in front of our eyeballs because, otherwise, we would not choose it. Again, how degrading can one be to Canadian artists and their ability to produce great content?

The fact of the matter is these things are not true, and I would like to explain my reasoning. The heritage minister has claimed that this bill would capture $1 billion from large streaming platforms. That is the amount that it would bring in, and that is meant to help further Canadian culture by helping to support these traditional artists. According to the government, it is forcing large streaming platforms to pay their fair share. At first blush, that might sound reasonable, but that is not actually what is happening here.

The government says that this money will save Canadian culture, but who says that Canadian culture actually needs saving? Who says that it is so fragile that it will fall apart without government intervention? Aside from all that, is Canadian culture not based on what Canadians determine it to be? The reality is the notion that large streaming platforms are not paying their fair share is a myth.

Investment in Canadian productions that would further our culture and tell our stories is not drying up, as the Liberals would like us to believe. On the contrary, huge investments are being made. It is just no longer being done through traditional broadcasters and the unions are not controlling it.

According to Wendy Noss of the Motion Picture Association Canada, who testified at the Senate committee, it spent more than $5 billion across this country in 2021 alone. The government is saying it is going to get $1 billion because of this legislation. This is one association and it is putting $5 billion per year into this country, so one cannot tell me or Canadians that somehow investment in homegrown talent is drying up. It is just not true.

If the money is being invested in talent, what is this bill really about?

Opposition Motion—Use of the Notwithstanding Clause

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Madam Speaker, let me begin by saying that I am not the star of this part of the show. I am merely opening for my colleague from Berthier—Maskinongé, and I am honoured to do so.

I love Quebec. I had the good fortune and great privilege to travel the continent in my previous job, and I have visited places around the world for pleasure. Everywhere we go, when we say we are from Quebec, people are curious. What is the deal with Quebec, anyway? Why will it not just melt into the English sea of North America? What is up with that place, where people do not eat the same foods or wear the same clothes as people in the rest of Canada? Just look at the member for Longueuil—Saint-Hubert. He toned it down today, but he usually dresses to impress.

What is going on with this province, where the vast majority of artists would rather work in their own language than tap into the riches of the anglophone market at their doorstep? The entire nation steps up to demand that Quebec's artists get the space they deserve on our radio stations, on TV, in our theatres and on streaming platforms.

Bill C‑11 was briefly discussed earlier. My colleague from Charlesbourg—Haute‑Saint‑Charles talked about it in his speech this morning. Bill C‑11 really highlighted the difference between Quebec and the rest of Canada. Whereas the cultural industry and community in Quebec mobilized to defend the distinct nature, specifically, of French language and culture, the rest of Canada had other concerns and opposed the bill for different reasons, reasons relevant to the rest of Canada. That is fine, but it proves once again that there are major differences.

I will continue to talk about those differences. What about this nation where women marry without taking their spouse's name? That is, when they do get married because fewer people in Quebec marry than in the rest of Canada. It is not because we are not beautiful or not in love. It is simply that we do not think the same way. It is a nation where parents, increasingly, give their children their mother's last name. That is quite new.

Abroad, people ask us what everyone thinks about the fact that Quebec rejects the exploitation of fossil fuels in favour of renewable energy and that it prefers electric cars to pickup trucks that are too large for our needs.

How does one manage a nation that wants to protect its language and culture, its fundamental values and its societal model at all costs? That is often the crux of the issue. We have differences of opinion on what integration should look like, on what society should look like. Quebec is open, but it also requires openness from those who want to integrate. We are not talking about openness to the point of forgetting oneself and melting into a homogeneous lump. No, that is not what we want at all. What we want is an openness to the fundamental values that form the bedrock of Quebec's society: equality between men and women, the separation of church and state, and French as the official language and as the common language.

Some members of the House may not know this, but Quebec has a declaration that immigrants who want to settle there must agree to abide by. It reads as follows:

Québec is a pluralist society that welcomes immigrants who come from the four corners of the earth with their know-how, skills, language, culture and religion.

Québec provides services to immigrants to help them integrate and participate fully and completely in Québec society in order to meet the challenges of a modern society such as economic prosperity, the survival of the French fact and openness to the world. In return, immigrants must adapt to their living environment.

All Quebecers, whether they are native-born or immigrants, have rights and responsibilities and can freely choose their lifestyle, opinions and religion; however, everyone must obey all laws no matter what their beliefs.

The Québec state and its institutions are secular; political and religious powers are separate.

All Quebecers enjoy rights and freedoms recognized by the Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms and other laws and have the responsibility of abiding by the values set forth in them.

It then goes on to talk about common values. I named three of them earlier.

The principal values set forth in this Charter, which are the foundation of Québec society, are as follows:

Québec is a free and democratic society.

Political and religious powers are separate in Québec.

Québec is a pluralist society.

Québec society is based on the rule of law.

Women and men have the same rights.

The exercise of human rights and freedoms must respect the rights and freedoms of others and the general well-being.

Québec society is also governed by the Charter of the French language, which makes French the official language of Québec. Accordingly, French is the normal and usual language of work, instruction, communications, trade and business.

These are important reminders that should be made as often as possible in the House, because we have noticed that people tend to forget. It is not us who forget them. We remember them all too well.

It is no secret that the reason behind the resurgence of the current debate on the notwithstanding clause has a lot to do with Quebec's recent use of section 33 in the case of a bill that deals with the French language and state secularism. Public debate often comes back to the path Quebec has taken over the past 75 to 80 years. In fact, it was in the 1960s that the differences really started to be more strongly felt.

The affirmation of Quebeckers, the affirmation of their values, is the desire to have their values and their vision of society recognized without embarrassment, without shame. We broke free from something. It was a long process, but we broke free. We wanted a secular society with religion on the sidelines, because the Catholic Church held sway over Quebec society for far too many decades. We wanted a society where the Church did not meddle in everything.

I am a child of that generation. I studied in a religious school in the 1960s. I was an altar boy. We went to church every Sunday, sometimes more often, depending on my mother's mood, so I completely understand why Quebec society evolved the way it did, an evolution that led to the removal of religion from the affairs of the state. I am not talking about people rejecting religion. People have the right to practise their religion. In Quebec, everyone thinks that everyone has the right to believe in what they want, but these beliefs and religious convictions are practised in private. It is not something that is practised in any public services offered by the government.

When we understand and clearly explain this evolution, we also understand Quebeckers' vigorous protection of the separation of church and state. The problem is that as the years go by, those who have witnessed this evolution are being heard less and less. Therefore, it is even more pertinent today not to fall into the trap of wedge politics. This seems to be the Prime Minister's approach. I will cite an example from yesterday, when we heard him say that the Bloc Québécois does not give a damn about francophones outside Quebec. How shockingly insulting.

I will come back to Bill C‑11, the former Bill C‑10, a bill that the Bloc Québécois worked on with francophone associations across Canada, Acadians from New Brunswick and francophones outside Quebec across the country, to present with one voice the importance of promoting all of Canada's francophone culture in our broadcasting system. Hearing that yesterday was an unacceptable insult.

Let us not fall into the trap of allowing ourselves to be divided. Avoiding that is the only way to build a society in which we can collaborate despite our differences. We certainly have differences. Regardless of the kind of society we develop over time, whether it is within a somewhat functional Canada or within an independent Quebec that will be a good partner and a good neighbour, we will have to learn to keep the lines of communication open, to talk to one another, understand one another and respect one another if we want to work in a productive and intelligent way. Failing that, it will be a constant battle.

To hell with populist rhetoric, and to hell with misinformation. As I said, the notwithstanding clause, although not there to be used all the time, is an important tool for preserving Quebec's vision for a secular society and for preserving and protecting Quebec and its core values, values that may offend some people who might not understand Quebec's reality.

Online News Act

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

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.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-18.

The Internet is supposed to be a place where anyone, regardless of their wealth, status or background, can express themselves in a place free from excessive restrictions and regulations.

The Internet was designed to be open and free. It was supposed to be a place where one could contribute on one’s terms, where a business can grow on its terms, where society can learn, share and communicate on its terms, free from government overreach.

The absence of government intervention was one of the very reasons why the Internet flourished into what we know it is today, and few other inventions can be attributed to creating such a significant economic, social, and cultural growth as the Internet, but now the Liberal government has made it its priority to regulate the Internet in an unprecedented way.

The Prime Minister has decided to target the free and open Internet, and maybe for those very reasons. First, it was Bill C-10, then it was Bill C-11 and now it is Bill C-18. I believe that the expansion of the government will harm the principles of a healthy media environment for years to come.

When people hear about governments regulating the Internet, few think of Canada, and rightfully so.

At a time when inflation is reaching record highs, when the cost of gas and groceries continues to rise and when heating a home is becoming unaffordable, the Liberal government is fixated on Internet regulations. Maybe the Liberals hoped that Canadians were distracted by real-life pressures and would ignore the Internet regulations, or maybe they do not care about the real issues that Canadians are currently facing in their everyday life.

Here we are, debating another government bill to regulate the Internet. Bill C-18 would force online platforms to give away their revenues to news organizations who choose to upload their content to their platform. Canadians are rightfully skeptical when the government talks about wealth redistribution. Canadians are even more concerned when the government talks about wealth redistribution within the news and media industry.

A free and independent media is critical and important to our nation’s democracy. Whenever the government tries to intervene, elected officials should pay close attention. It is our job to thoroughly examine the consequences of any attempt to hand out money or change the rules for news and media in our country.

Canadians are still questioning the government’s $600-million media bailout, but now the government is trying to create a new revenue source for media with somebody else’s money. I must ask how we can maintain a free market if we indirectly subsidize companies by extracting the profits of their competitors.

It is important to note that no one is forcing news organizations to upload hyperlinks to online platforms. They are free to make this choice. Many publishers upload their content to platforms such as Facebook and Google to benefit themselves. It is no secret that more people are likely to read an article if it is uploaded online because it suddenly becomes more accessible to the public. When an article is uploaded to the Internet for the world to read, it breaks through those geographic walls that a print newspaper is restricted to.

Many writers across Canada have experienced incredible success because of their ability to upload content online. In fact, many publishers pay Google and Facebook to boost their content through ads. Without online platforms like Facebook and Google, many writers and independent news organizations would not exist today.

The Internet has provided a lot of opportunity for media companies who were previously unable to enter the market due to high barriers of entry. Members of the House should be proud of the positive outcomes that online platforms have created for content creators.

Not only is no one forcing news outlets to upload their content online, but also nothing is preventing them from negotiating individual contracts with online platforms. As of today, many news outlets have proactively entered business agreements with online platforms to progress mutual business needs without government intervention, as I heard in a previous speech here from my colleague.

We must also ask who will be eligible to receive the government-mandated shared revenue if Bill C-18 were to become law. The government claims that only legitimate news organizations will be eligible for these funds, but who does the government deem as a legitimate news organization? According to one of the government-written criteria in Bill C-18, a legitimate news organization must produce news “primarily focused on matters of general interest”.

However, I must further ask what the matters of general interest are and who determines them. I can assure members of the House that the general interests in rural Canada are different than in urban Canada, and general interests in Atlantic Canada are different than those in northern and western Canada. These are important questions that Canadians deserve the answers to.

Instead, the Liberals have left these important decisions to the CRTC, the same CRTC that is already bogged down in a mountain of responsibility from other Internet regulations that the government has initiated.

I should note that, if Bill C-18 passes, Canada's government-funded media outlet, the CBC, will be eligible for compensation. Members heard that right. There will be more money for the CBC. The Parliamentary Budget Officer reported that more than 75% of the money will go to the CBC, Rogers and Bell.

The government claims that Bill C-18 is to share the wealth of online platforms to smaller media outlets, such as newspapers. As an MP who proudly represents many small-town weekly newspapers, I understand that these businesses have experienced significant market pressures in recent history.

The reality is that most of the money redistributed by Bill C-18 will only go to the media giants, such as The Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail. They are the ones that have the most content online, and therefore, they will get the most money from this legislation.

Many local newspapers I represent do not even upload their content to online platforms. That means they would not see any of the money the government claims they will get. I wholeheartedly agree with local newspapers across this nation that are frustrated. However, Bill C-18 is not the silver bullet. In fact, many are warning that Bill C-18 would be detrimental to Canadian journalism.

At the beginning of my speech, I spoke about the importance of free and open Internet. It is a principle that I, and many Canadians, strongly believe in. However, Bill C-18 breaks the concept of a free and open Internet. Bill C-18 is bad for independent media, and it is bad for competition.

At a time when many Canadians believe the freedom to express oneself is threatened, the Liberal government continues down a path of unprecedented Internet regulation. It would be nice to see the government put as much effort into reducing Internet and cell phone bills as it is putting into regulating the Internet, but I digress.

I will end with a quote from Vinton Cerf, a founding father of the Internet. He stated, “if all of us...don't pay attention to what is going on, users worldwide will be at risk of losing the open and free Internet that has brought so much to so many and can bring so much more.” That is very true.

The Internet, a creation that was built on the principle of being open and free, is now threatened. We can either allow the government to expand its power over the Internet, or preserve the principles it was founded on. That is why I will be voting against Bill C-18.