Canadian Heritage Committee on Jan. 29th, 2021

[Kevin Chan]

I think the truthful answer is that we have business and professional relationships with all organizations that have a presence on Facebook, and also, obviously, with organizations having an interest in framing rules for Facebook.

First of all, this job description was public, and it was shared broadly with various and many different organizations and people across the public, private and non-profit sectors. There are programs within the government itself, in the public service of Canada, that facilitate this. In terms of a public job description that was broadly shared on social media and with many different contacts, is there a problem with sharing that with individuals in a particular organization? No, I don't believe there's a problem there.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Okay.

Let's talk a little about the news. Earlier, during the exchange of information, I heard your response to my colleague Mr. Waugh concerning the possibility of news publishers using your platform. There's always a nuance that's misunderstood in the problem that this represents. The problem isn't the platform and the fact that you allow them to get visitors to their online platform through yours. The problem is really the ad revenue grab. We know very well that the more traffic you generate, the more advertising revenue you're going to generate, at the expense of those you say you're helping.

Could you explain how you can benefit the media financially? Right now, the opposite is happening, despite what you seem to be claiming.

[Kevin Chan]

I'll turn it in a moment to Marc Dinsdale, who can maybe answer this question better because he's the expert. However, as we indicated earlier in our opening statement, in fact, newspaper publishers in Canada benefit from free distribution on Facebook, which we estimate to be in the order of hundreds of millions of dollars, so that is the value of that distribution.

Marc, do you want to weigh in a bit more on this?

[Marc Dinsdale]

Certainly.

When we look at this question of value, it is a very complicated one. As Kevin said, there's the distribution value of Facebook putting content in front of people who are interested in that content. There's the referral value of sending them to the people at the publishers' websites. Once they're on the publisher's website, it is the publisher who monetizes all the advertisement that they sell on that website; it is they who monetize any relationships they build to sell subscriptions, to solicit donations, to sell membership models, and so on.

I think those are the numbers that we don't see reported in all this, and we don't have the visibility into that side of the publisher's business as to what this means, but it isn't insignificant.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Dinsdale. We have to move on from there.

Mr. Boulerice, you have six minutes.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being with us today.

You have become a key player in the public debate. Indeed, you have a considerable influence on millions of people. As the saying goes, “With great power comes great responsibility”. From our point of view, you can, but more importantly, you must do better in many ways.

I'm going to ask you some very specific questions and ask you to keep your answers fairly short. Facebook spokesperson Meg Sinclair told the Toronto Star that it is Facebook's standard practice to seek our political analysts with government experience.

Mr. Chan, since you've been working for Facebook, have you or anyone in your organization asked other officials or other federal government departments to circulate a job posting for Facebook? If so, could you tell me which department and which position?

[Kevin Chan]

I can't speak for everybody at Facebook. All I can say is that as I indicated, this publicly available job description was shared far and wide in the public, private and non-profit sectors. I can tell you that nobody from Canadian Heritage was interviewed for the position, although we did interview people for the position from various political parties, including yours, sir.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Chan, have you ever asked political staff to circulate a job posting for Facebook? If so, in which department and what was the position?

I hope to get an answer this time.

[Kevin Chan]

I gave you a perfectly good answer last time, sir. I'm happy to say that I did not do that, to my.... We circulated it far and wide, but there was no purposeful attempt to say please circulate this or that to specific people. This was a public job description, so again, I do not believe it to be the case. That's the best I can give you in terms of an answer, because it's been a year.

Again, I try to be as open and honest as I can. I hope you can believe me on that, sir.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Many people are wondering about the close relationship between Facebook and the current government. There are a lot of lobbying meetings. Do you think it's ethically acceptable to ask Mr. Ripley to post a job offer on Facebook while the government is considering legislative changes that will affect you and could affect your business and even your revenue? For a lot of people, it's all pretty shady.

Do you think it's ethically acceptable to do this while legislative changes are being considered that will affect you?

[Kevin Chan]

No. I don't wholly agree with your use of the word “louche”.

Once again, we are calling for regulation. Our posture is not the one that you are, I think, with all due respect, implying. We welcome regulation. We're calling for more of it. We are prepared to work with government on it.

The world, as I think you know, is complicated. We need to work together to solve hard problems. Facebook is here to do that. I am here to do that with you and with other members of Parliament. We are not adversaries. The idea that we would share a public job position to various people across sectors, the fact that many people applied, that we interviewed only a very few set of people, including people from your party—I think that speaks to the fact that we have to work together.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

I'm going to switch to another subject and ask you to give me a very short answer to a very simple question.

How much income tax did Facebook pay in Canada in 2019-2020?

[Kevin Chan]

I'm afraid I don't have that number with me.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Did Facebook pay any income tax in Canada in 2019-2020?

[Kevin Chan]

Yes. My understanding is that we do. In fact, we do pay payroll taxes. We pay income tax through Facebook Canada. We pay all sorts of different taxes.

I think what you're asking is whether we pay enough taxes. If I may, again, this is not something that we are resisting. This is something that other...that countries around the world have to agree on a new way to allocate tax from multinational digital companies. There is an OECD process, as I indicated, that's under way. We certainly support that. We hope they will come to an agreement. I think we heard from member states, I think just yesterday or the day before, that they too are optimistic on a deal by 2021, sometime this year. We look forward to that conclusion, because we are obviously prepared to work on compliance with any new rules that will be created through this process.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

I feel that this may end up like the play Waiting for Godot. I hope that it does not and that I will be pleasantly surprised.

How much time do I have left, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

You have 30 seconds.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

You claim that you are making efforts to limit hate speech on your platforms, but we can still see a huge amount of it. Your algorithms are creating echo chambers where people become radicalized, sometimes even inciting them to resort to violence.

What do you think about the idea of having a public regulating body that would force you, within certain limits, to moderate and limit things posted on Facebook that could never be published in an ordinary newspaper?

[Kevin Chan]

As I have indicated in the op-ed with Mr. Stursberg, but also more recently in the opening statement, we welcome more regulation.

You're right, sir. Right now it's private companies like Facebook that are deciding what is and isn't allowed on Facebook. We think that doesn't sit well with many people, and they want public rules where there is legitimate public and democratic accountability. To the extent that law-makers can agree on where that line should be drawn, and then impose those lines on us, I think that would be certainly welcome.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Chan.

Thank you, Mr. Boulerice.

We have Mr. Aitchison for five minutes, please.

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I appreciate everyone being here.

I actually really do accept the explanations that I've heard about these emails that have gone back and forth, and I appreciate the representatives from Facebook being here.

I'm actually a little frustrated, though, in that we've had some discussion here already about emails going back and forth between the Minister of Canadian Heritage and Facebook, and then there was some suggestion by some of the members from the governing party on this committee that, in fact, questioning these emails was tantamount to questioning the integrity of the public service and that's the kind of thing that we should never do.

My question is for Ms. Curran.

You seemed quite content, along with your colleagues, to come here and answer questions. Would you agree that healthy questions about the public service and their political masters are good for a democracy?

[Rachel Curran]

Of course. Yes, absolutely, I think opposition parties should hold the government to account, and part of that includes holding the public service to account and asking them the appropriate questions.

I think deputy minister Laurendeau answered the questions well and sufficiently, but you should absolutely have the ability to ask those questions and to get responses.

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Then, if I can follow that up, I think it's important for us to be respectful in our dialogue at these committees and when we do ask questions, to do so in a respectful way. To question the integrity of somebody asking a question seems just irresponsible to me.

Obviously you're looking a lot at managing speech on Facebook. I would assume that's a big part of your exercise, trying to make sure there is respect on all sides.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

I believe the answer is more correctly for you if you thought that a question was out of order, not for a witness on a second panel.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

I just want to remind members to try stay within the realm of what we're talking about here. I can read the motion out again, but I think it's all in front of you. Have a look at the motion, please, and try to stick to the confines of the intent of what we're trying to explore today.

Mr. Aitchison, we go back to you.