Our membership depends on the continuing support of owners of news operations. With fewer owners now covering Canadian news, there are also fewer news directors, and every year brings new batches of layoffs of newsroom staff. That results in less original reporting, less investigative reporting, and less connection with the community. In some parts of the country, investigative journalism has disappeared almost entirely.
We understand the economic realities that have led to covering local news this way. Some witnesses to this committee have already talked about the shift from dollars to dimes in advertising revenue, when comparing TV news to online news viability. We have also heard that in most cases the number of minutes and hours of local news hasn't changed much. However, the quantitative measure isn't always reflective of the qualitative impact of changes in newsrooms. While the sustainability of local TV and radio news is an important question for regulators to discuss from the advertising revenue perspective, that is not our expertise. We wish to leave it to the employers and regulators to resolve.