Canadian Heritage Committee on Feb. 27th, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

I now call the meeting to order. Welcome to meeting number 112 of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage.

I would like to acknowledge that this meeting is taking place on the unceded traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe people.

It's a hybrid meeting that we're having. As you can well see, we have a lot of people sitting out there in neverland. Most of them have been tested, and they're connected.

I'm going to say the usual housekeeping things.

While the Board of Internal Economy does not mandate that we wear masks, its advisable if you're not well that you consider your colleagues and wear a mask.

To the witnesses, we have a very powerful audio system. If you have any devices near your mics, I will ask you to move them, because they can create feedback that would cause a problem for the interpreters. Similarly, for the rest of us who have them, let's move our devices away from our mics.

Also, you cannot take pictures of the proceedings. The meeting will be online. You can get it later on if you wish, but you shouldn't be taking pictures right now. That's not allowed.

One final thing: Each group is going to get five minutes to present. If you're a member of a group, you can decide who is doing that five minutes. If you are an individual, you have five minutes. I will give you a 30-second shout-out, which means you should wrap up what you're saying because you will get an opportunity later on when you are being asked questions by the members to be able to elaborate and expand on what you didn't get to say in your presentation.

Any questions and comments should be made through the chair.

That's about it, so we will begin.

This is a study on the media. It has been brought forward by our esteemed colleague Monsieur Champoux, and we are at the last meeting today, so we're not going to be able to hear from the people who were not able to attend, but we we hope they are going to send us written presentations so that we can read them as we do our report.

We will begin with John Gormley, lawyer, retired radio talk show host and former Member of Parliament, by video conference. He is appearing as an individual.

Mr. Gormley, the floor is yours for five minutes, please.

[John Gormley, Lawyer, Retired radio talk show host and Former Member of Parliament, As an Individual]

Madam Chair, committee members, thank you so much for the opportunity to present a few thoughts. I think my remarks time to five minutes and 15 seconds, so I'll try to get them succinctly delivered.

Gosh, time has flown. I chaired the predecessor to this committee in 1988, the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture. Albeit very late, it is good to be back.

It's a challenging time for some in the media. Many observers saw this coming from concerns in the 1980s and beyond over media ownership structure, erosion of local newsrooms, technological convergence, and the impacts of the Internet and social media.

Should Canada's news sector hold a conference or forum on the future of the media? Well, why not? The more voices and perspectives, the better.

Asking if the government support this forum implies that taxpaying Canadians should pay, yet again, for more hand-wringing about the media. I am not for this. I don't necessarily accept the supposition that Canadian media are in trouble because they're underfunded by the government.

The government has nothing to do with this. The media are in trouble because they did two things: First, they bet on a modernized definition of journalism that backfired and lost audiences, and second, they whistled past the graveyard as the Internet and social media developed the technology to migrate content and revenue away from the media, which was entirely predictable, given the behaviour of large Canadian media organizations.

I have recently wondered where the media would be today if the federal government had done nothing—no local journalism initiative, no journalism labour tax credit, no enhancements to the periodical fund, and not even embarking on the Online News Act. Does any of this—or all the money in the world, for that matter—nudge the media toward innovation, adaptation and change?

For generations, three clear boundaries existed in journalism: There was reportage, an accurate, unbiased, neutral, factual chronicling of what happened; there was editorial commentary, featuring opinion and perspective and the expression of diverse and divergent opinions and voices; and for those media that could afford it, there was investigative and in-depth work, which often revealed wrongdoing, forced accountability and advocated change.

The legacy media and their wire services intentionally blurred these distinctions and decided that agenda-based journalism would replace balance, factuality, impartiality, a freedom from ideology and bias, and a divestment of personal opinions and agendas. With this came a laser-like focus on social justice, climate change, drug use harm reduction, intersectionality, race, colonialism and gender politics. The media became so preoccupied with allyship that they stood up for and defended certain causes rather than scrutinizing and reporting on them.

Not surprisingly, this change in journalism challenged the public's traditionally high level of trust in the media. In part, people no longer believed that the media were in it for them as neutral observers dedicated to truth, and a rational response for news consumers was to vote with their feet and seek alternatives. At the same time, the Internet had developed with astonishing pace and scope, and by the second decade of the 2000s, social media flourished, consumer choice was vast. The legacy media struggled for audience, advertising revenues migrated and the die was cast.

Then why does the government today bear responsibility for the media's miscalculation? If this were a crisis, like rebuilding a destroyed hospital or vital infrastructure, by all means the government should step in. However, the roles and functions of journalism and the modern media are still evolving. They're being redefined. There's a risk that government gets in the way by subsidizing inefficiency and not incentivizing the necessary change. Even the legacy and the new media lobbying for government money, and accepting it, does little to enhance confidence in their independence or reliability.

Does government funding pay for better journalism? Does it restore credibility and trust? Does it create new models for telling our stories and delivering important information? Does it drive toward financial sustainability, or simply postpone the inevitable?

Government funding does not incentivize news organizations to make better decisions. It does not compel the media to make subscriptions viable or to develop micro-subscriptions so that consumers can pay as they go, nor does it advance philanthropically supported journalism, donor/member funding models, or non-profits.

President Ronald Reagan famously summarized an old political joke from the 1970s by sarcastically observing, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.'”

I respectfully suggest that policy-makers carefully examine what, how and who they are trying to help in this case.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much. You went exactly 15 seconds over. In this committee, we allow some leeway now and then. Thank you, Mr. Gormley.

Now we'll go to Tara Henley, who is a journalist, author and podcaster.

Go ahead, Ms. Henley, for five minutes, please.

[Tara Henley, Journalist, Author, Podcaster, As an Individual]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Good afternoon to the committee. Thank you for inviting me to participate in your study on a national forum on the media.

My name is Tara Henley. I am a journalist and author in Toronto, and I am the host of the Lean Out podcast, a subscriber-supported weekly current affairs interview show that hosts guests from around the world, including many journalists. I have been a journalist for 22 years, with experience in newspapers, magazines, digital, radio and television, as well as in publishing a current affairs book.

For the past year, one of my central lines of inquiry at Lean Out has been on the collapse of the media. I've interviewed researchers, authors, historians and professors; I've read reports and covered journalism panels and forums; I've read a large volume of emails and comments from the public; and I have spoken with journalists in both legacy and independent media, as well as opinion writers across the political spectrum and media entrepreneurs. I am currently writing the 2024 Massey essay on the state of the media, to be published in the Literary Review of Canada this spring. The focus of that essay is on declining trust in the media.

As this committee has already heard, the problems facing Canadian media are complex and multi-faceted, and our newsrooms are under enormous pressure. We know that the collapse of the Canadian media is largely economic. The Internet has disrupted our industry and the advertising business model has imploded. We also have heard from witnesses at this committee that the industry faces challenges with ownership and consolidation. We have seen mass outlet closures, dwindling audiences and mass layoffs. By some estimates, there are now just 10,000 to 12,000 journalists in this country.

Government intervention in the industry has also presented challenges for some players, including independent and digital outlets, and has resulted in Meta pulling out of news in Canada. We heard powerful testimony on that recently from media CEO Brandon Gonez.

The media are in a profoundly weakened state, and there are consequences to this. Good journalism involves revealing inconvenient facts, airing unpopular perspectives and challenging dominant narratives. The volatility of our industry risks breeding conformity and caution, both in leadership and in our press corps, and this can erode the quality of coverage. In the current climate, the training for the next generation is also jeopardized, as there are fewer mentors and outlets—particularly, fewer local news outlets—for journalists to train at.

An important point is that the economic precarity of journalism means that young people without family financial support are less likely to go into the business and do internships or poorly paid jobs in the expensive cities where our media are now concentrated. This reduces the diversity of perspective in our newsrooms at a time when we most need to increase it.

As the industry is collapsing, the public relations industry is exploding. Cecil Rosner, formerly of The Fifth Estate at CBC, notes in his recent book that journalists are now outnumbered by PR professionals by a ratio of 13:1. We in the media are facing not just catastrophic economic and structural pressures; we're also grappling with a serious decline in public trust and a citizenry that is increasingly tuning out from the news and is increasingly hostile towards journalists.

These are all major problems for maintaining a robust and healthy press, so I very much support the idea of a national forum on the media, especially one that would have meaningful participation from the public. If we want to save the Canadian media, we're going to have to listen to the public and we're going to have to forge a journalism centred on the public interest as the public understands it, as witnesses Sue Gardner, Jen Gerson and Colette Brin have already persuasively argued before this committee.

I do not believe the government should have a role in facilitating a news forum, and I especially don't think it should fund it. In my view, any funding from the government that flows to the media at this point would hinder our attempts to rebuild trust. There is evidence to suggest that subsidies have created an environment in which segments of the public believe the media have been bought off by the government. We heard this view at committee as well in words from Unifor’s Lana Payne, who said that her members face complaints that they are a “tax-funded mouthpiece for the PMO”. We know from a 2023 Angus Reid poll that most Canadians—59%—oppose government funding of private newsrooms, believing it compromises journalists' independence.

I do want to be clear: I do not believe subsidies result in direct editorial interference, but that doesn’t mean they don't impact trust. As an industry, we have a duty to insulate ourselves from the power that we are meant to hold to account. The media derive their credibility from their independence from power, particularly government power, and maintaining public confidence in that independence is of paramount importance, as important as maintaining the independence itself. We must contend with the public perception of government funding and understand that it likely erodes trust at the exact moment, unfortunately, that the Canadian press most needs to rebuild trust.

Without trust, we have no audience. Without an audience, we have no revenue. Without revenue, we have no path forward for the Canadian media, and without the media, we do not have an informed electorate or a functioning democracy.

The Canadian media do need to be saved. That is very true. My message is simply that the government cannot save us: We have to save ourselves.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much.

I will now go to Ms. Boltman. Is Ms. Boltman ready?

[The Clerk of the Committee, Ms. Geneviève Desjardins]

She's not.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Can I go to Ms. Andrews? I will go with Ms. Andrews, director, government and media relations. The two of them are from the same organization. Those are our last two witnesses.

We will suspend to do a sound check with those two witnesses, if you don't mind.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

I call the meeting back to order.

I'd like to ask Brent Jolly, president of the Canadian Association of Journalists, to begin as a witness. Brent, you have five minutes.

[Brent Jolly, President, Canadian Association of Journalists]

Thank you.

Thank you to everybody on the committee for providing me with the opportunity to explain to you my view on the current crises—and I use the plural here—facing the Canadian media industry right now.

I am speaking to you today as president of the Canadian Association of Journalists. For those committee members who have never heard of us, the association is the national voice of Canadian journalists in all types of media. It represents more than 1,000 members across the country.

For nearly a half of a century, the CAJ's mission has been at the forefront of providing members with high-quality professional development training opportunities and to engage in public interest advocacy work that supports all Canadians' right to know. This includes subjects such as access to information, transparency, public disclosure and ensuring that Canadian journalists are free to exercise their constitutionally protected role to report on matters in the public interest.

Given that I have limited time to offer opening remarks, and in light of some of the outstanding quality of the testimony that has already been offered by witnesses to this committee, I am going to refrain from rehashing everything that's already been read into the public record.

My reason, though, for attending and wanting to speak with you today is to present a rather clear and unequivocal message: Many journalists in Canada are hurting.

We are hurting financially, as salaries do not keep up with inflation. We are hurting financially when staff positions are replaced by internships, or not replaced at all. We are hurting emotionally, oscillating between the challenges of navigating an increasingly hostile world while trying to ignore the deep feelings of anxiety about when the next so-called “cutdown day” will come. It's a reality. It's a proverbial Sword of Damocles that hangs over our collective heads.

We are also hurting developmentally, as professional development budgets have been slashed. Just think about it: Talented musicians need to practice. Olympic-level athletes spend hours in the gym and developing robust dietary regimens. Journalists too need training to ensure their skills are kept sharp in order to navigate an increasingly opaque and hostile world. The training, unfortunately, has become a luxury and not a necessity.

I challenge you to imagine a profession that is so essential to the smooth functioning of democracy, and yet whose conditions are so difficult for those on the front line of the battle between truth, lies and disinformation.

Seldom does a week go by when I don't speak to journalists who have played the game the right way, only to be left with their hands palms to the sky, trying to figure out what to do next and why they're continuing to devote their life to the craft of journalism. However, right now I can also say at this very minute that there are hundreds of early-career journalists who are working in communities across the country as part of the local journalism initiative. Rather than thinking about their next assignment, I suspect many of their minds are on whether they will have jobs come April, as funding has not been renewed as of yet. It's code red, and I hope you hear the alarm sounding.

While I'm grateful to the committee for wanting to organize a national forum on the media, I fear that, as Mr. Champoux pointed out a few meetings ago, this decision comes 10 years too late. Alas, time is running out.

The future of journalism is predicated on making tough choices, perhaps unpopular ones. However, I will appropriate an old baseball metaphor: It's better to go down swinging than to be caught looking at strike three with the bat resting on your shoulder.

I look forward to a healthy conversation with members of this committee this afternoon and I'm happy to provide some insights on potential actions that could be taken.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Mr. Jolly.

We will now go to Ms. Andrews for five minutes, please.

Go ahead, Ms. Andrews.

[Sarah Andrews, Director, Government and Media Relations, Friends of Canadian Media]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, committee members.

Friends of Canadian Media is a non-partisan citizens' movement that stands up for Canadian voices in Canadian media. From public broadcasting to news, culture and online civil discourse, we represent hundreds of thousands of everyday citizens from across the country who want to protect and defend Canada's rich cultural sovereignty and the healthy democracy it sustains.

I would like to start by acknowledging Parliament's most recent actions. Bills C‑11 and C‑18 triggered considerable debate, but together these policies represent a necessary and vital impulse to do something, to act rather than to acquiesce, and to react to the eroding impact that foreign tech companies are having on our news, our culture and even our democratic health.

When it comes to the news crisis, many shrug their shoulders and suggest there is nothing to be done, that this crisis represents the irresistible march of time and technology, that we are powerless to act, and that the public doesn't even care, but that is wrong. Every day, our supporters tell us how much they do care and how deeply concerned they are about the future of the news sector. They feel what's being lost, and they want better.

They're not alone. Recent polling we commissioned shows that for all the downsizing and derision, Canadians still turn to so-called traditional media to get their news. Seventy-three percent of adults said they deemed news from television, radio and newspapers to be trustworthy and reliable. By contrast, social media was trusted by only 30% of Canadians. Sadly, nearly 80% of Canadians felt that it's getting more and more difficult to know what is true and what is not.

This last statistic should come as no surprise. With the relentless pace of news layoffs, editorially rigorous and trusted journalism is increasingly being replaced by misinformation and disinformation. Some of it is just sloppy. Some of it is ideological. Some of it is predatory trolling for profit. Some of it is outright malicious and even dangerous.

Here we are, knee-deep in a Canadian news crisis, but perhaps it's time to focus less on the result and more on the cause, because if we follow the money, it is clear that advertising revenues have fuelled this crisis in the news.

Over the past decade, GAFAMs—digital giants like Meta and Google—have made their way into our daily lives. These platforms are increasingly coveted and have used their global reach and unfettered market advantage to cannibalize advertising revenues. Not only have we enabled them to do this, we've encouraged it.

Currently, in Canada, advertising purchased on foreign digital platforms is considered a tax-deductible expense. In 2018, when our organization published our study “Close the Loophole! The Deductibility of Foreign Internet Advertising”, we estimated that $5 billion in advertising was being extracted from our economy. We need to close the gap and encourage Canadian advertisers to choose homegrown platforms.

However, we can't stop there. Programmatic advertising has spawned a veritable misinformation and disinformation economy in which toxic content is fuelled by a near-constant flow of advertising dollars. This disinformation economy is worth several billion dollars, most of which ends up in Google's pockets. The company systematically ignores its own standards and practices designed to ensure that digital ads are not placed on sites offering extreme content and ideas.

We can act by imposing transparency and accountability requirements that would help redirect advertising dollars to trusted sources of information, away from those whose business models allow them to profit from amplifying violence, hatred and disinformation.

We must also provide CBC/Radio-Canada with a sustainable funding model. It is the only broadcaster required by law to produce news in all regions. Unfortunately, however, it is crumbling under the weight of chronic underfunding, compounded by a freeze in the last federal budget. As private broadcasters continue to withdraw from news production, particularly local news, our national public broadcaster must have the resources to fill the void and fulfil its mandate. What's more, if CBC/Radio-Canada were better funded, this could reduce its dependence on advertising.

Before we wrap up and address any questions you may have, we want to answer this committee's central question about whether there is a need for a wider study of the Canadian news ecosystem. Our answer is a definite yes.

However, while that study is taking place, we do encourage Parliament to turn its focus to the advertising economy and its tremendous impact on our news, our culture and our democracy. Canadians are looking to you to take up this task, and we urge you to move swiftly and to take a big swing, because half measures have brought us here, to a news crisis that may quickly become a democratic one, and that would be unacceptable.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Now I want to go the question-and-answer component of this meeting.

There are some rules here, basically. You're going to get questions from a representative of each political party, and I'm going to give them a 30-second warning when the time is almost finished.

The first round is a six-minute round. Those six minutes include the questions and answers, so I would like everyone to exercise their journalistic skills and their parliamentary skills and be as crisp as possible in terms of questions and answers. Thank you.

We begin now with the Conservatives. The first person up for six minutes is Rachael Thomas.

Rachael, you have six minutes.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Thank you to each of you for joining us. It's nice to have you here today.

My first question is for Mrs. Henley.

I was reading an article that you drafted not too long ago, and in this article, you state the following:

I don't think any government program can ultimately save the news media unless the public was willing to allow news to become a permanent ward of the state.

I believe you expanded on this a little bit in your opening comments—the fact that government involvement breaks trust with the public and ultimately isn't a long-term solution for the viability of news media in Canada.

However, I'm interested in this statement that you've outlined here. You say that any government program cannot save news media unless, of course, the public is willing to allow news to become a permanent ward of the state.

Can you expand on that a little bit?

[Tara Henley]

The quote that you have referenced I don't actually recognize from my own work, but the sentiment I certainly agree with. Basically, I think that the intervention of the government in our industry has caused harm more than it has advanced the interests of the Canadian press. I think that at this point, we need to look at what the media can do to save itself, and I have some ideas on that.

First of all, I think the necessary precondition is for the government to end interventions in the industry, and I would encourage Parliament to think along those lines. At this point, we need full competition, and in order to have full competition, we need that to change.

I also think that we need to have a reform of the CBC. I do believe that we need a strong public broadcaster, particularly in this moment, but in order for the CBC to fulfill its role in society, I think it's important to have a mandate review. I would like to see some of the changes suggested by my colleague Jen Gerson. I would like to see the CBC refocused on local news, on investigative journalism and on filling the gaps in the market that are difficult and expensive to produce.

I would like to see the CBC reorient away from competing with digital innovators and move towards supporting them. There are a lot of ways it could do that. I think it could play a vital role in training the next generation of journalists, as it already does to some extent. I also think that the CBC could use its facilities to allow training journalists to make podcasts. I think the CBC could play a really important role in the digital innovation that's already under way and that needs to continue. It needs to stop being a commercial entity that is competing against these start-ups.

I also think that there needs to be a vast experimentation in business model. We're already seeing that to some extent. We're seeing start-ups like Substack, which is the platform that I'm on, being very successful at monetizing journalism. We're seeing Paul Wells, for example, and Jen Gerson at The Line use that model to much success.

We're also seeing innovation in terms of a charity model. The Hub is one that stands out. I think you're going to see a lot of hybrid models going forward.

The other thing that I think needs to happen is that we need to look to other markets for inspiration, and on that front, I would refer the committee to a book called What Works in Community News. It is just recently out, and it's full of success stories from across the U.S.

Finally, I have four specific suggestions for media. I think we need to decentralize. I think we need to utilize remote work so that journalists can work in their own homes in small communities and not have to move to Toronto. I think we need to stop hiring for university degrees, which I don't think are necessary, and this would also expand the pool of talent and perspectives. I think we need to increase ideological diversity within our press corps, and I think we need to vastly increase public participation. I think we really need to hear more and listen more to the public about what it wants us to do and how it wants us to serve the public interest.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Thank you, Mrs. Henley. That is quite the list. I appreciate your attention to detail in offering those solutions to us here today.

I want to turn my attention to Mr. Gormley.

Thank you for joining us here today.

Interestingly enough, you mentioned that you're a former member of Parliament. You served here in the late 1980s, but you didn't mention your background in news. I'm not sure if you would wish to just summarize that quickly. I acknowledge that you are here as an individual today, but you certainly have a breadth of knowledge that comes from the newsroom.

My question for you comes from your opening remarks. You said, “There's a risk that government gets in the way by subsidizing inefficiency and not incentivizing the necessary change.” I'm hoping you can expand on that. You have about a minute.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have slightly under a minute, Mr. Gormley.

[John Gormley]

Thanks, Mrs. Thomas.

Yes, I was born and raised a radio journalist as a kid in high school, then in university, then as an assistant news director and news reader, writer and beat reporter. Then I was a talk show host, then a member of Parliament, then a lawyer and then was back for 25 years as a radio talk show host in Saskatchewan. I have been blessed, since I was 17, to have experienced everything from how newsrooms operate to how the strong opinion perspective media work in what I have done as a talk show host.

Regarding innovation, adaptation and change, at the risk of sounding as sensationalistic as I accuse many journalists of sounding, I really wonder if there has to be a fundamental reconstruction. I must confess to being—

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Excuse me, Mr. Gormley. I am so sorry, but you've run out of time. Can you elaborate on that in another question? I'm sure you will get another one to elaborate on your thoughts. Hold those thoughts. Thank you.

I'm going to go to the next person. We have Taleeb Noormohamed for the Liberals. You have six minutes, please.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Thank you very much to all of you for being here.

In something that will seem uncharacteristic for me on this committee, I would like to pick up where Ms. Thomas left off, if I could, and start with you, Mrs. Henley.

I'm really interested in your thinking around the idea that there should be no government support for journalism and news. I find it interesting that you would say that, because a lot of organizations, including True North media, Postmedia and the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, which are no fans of government, have very actively taken advantage of public funds.

I'm curious. When you talk about the diversity of viewpoints and the different perspectives, how does that reconcile with the fact that very vociferous critics of the government have certainly not become wards of the state? It's quite the opposite, and in fact they use that government funding to say things and do things that would be diametrically opposed to what a ward of government might want.

I'm wondering if you could share your thoughts on that.

[Tara Henley]

I think you're absolutely right that there are outlets that have taken advantage of the subsidies and have still maintained strong criticism of the government. I think that is a fair point.

I would like to say, though, with regard to government funding, that the final judge of whether the government funding is appropriate is the public, and we are seeing strong signs from the public that it is impacting public trust. I've heard this in interviews. I've heard this from professors. I've heard this from experts in the industry. I've heard from fellow journalists that frequently the feedback they're getting on social media is exactly what we heard from Unifor, which is that the media are a mouthpiece for the PMO.

I also hear that as well from the public over and over again. I think that the defining factor here is public feedback. I think we really do need to pay attention to it.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

That's interesting. There are those who would say that True North is a mouthpiece for the opposition, right? I think this storyline cuts both ways.

I'd like to go to Mr. Jolly for a moment and then follow up with Ms. Andrews with the following question.

You've heard one of your colleagues say that government should get out of the business of supporting news and journalists. You represent journalists. You represent, in some sense, organizations that are trying hard to deliver journalism in a complicated environment, where I think that we can all acknowledge that the media have not moved as quickly as they can to be adaptive and to look at new ways of communicating with Canadians.

How would you respond to this? How do you respond to the idea that government should get completely out of the business of supporting journalism, particularly when you think about rural communities, indigenous communities, the north, and so on and so forth?

[Brent Jolly]

To be brief, I think any idea of abandoning that is pretty facile and doesn't understand the economics of how journalism works or how Canada has traditionally operated. I look at the United States. California is introducing bills to support local journalism, and Illinois, New York state and Utah, and I believe there's another one as well, but I could be mistaken.

In the U.K., there's the BBC. There are the nordic models in Scandinavia. They've all relied on some sort of government subsidy to exist. I think you can make an argument—a philosophical one—that, sure, the government could get out and let the survival of the fittest ultimately prevail. My recommendation is that there won't be much left to support our democracy. We're going to devolve into a nation of TikTokers and YouTubers who are out there not communicating stories in the public interest but just looking to profit off of whatever rumour is going around the Internet. I think that's pretty clear, based on my understanding of things.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Jolly.

Ms. Andrews, could you answer the same question?

[Sarah Andrews]

Definitely.

I think, first of all, there aren't just subsidies. When we talk about government and parliamentary intervention, we're also talking about actions that have already been taken, like Bill C-18, for example, which does not provide a subsidy from the government; it is in fact the government intervening and correcting an imbalance in the market. I think it's very important to look at where we can intervene with the tools in our tool box, and not provide a direct subsidy but sort of correct those market imbalances.

As I mentioned in my remarks, closing the loophole in the Income Tax Act is one of those opportunities, and we're very happy to hear that the heritage minister is taking a further look into that.

Of course, I come back to the CBC, the public broadcaster. The parliamentary appropriation is such an important part of the CBC's budget. In fact, we at Friends of Canadian Media would advocate that the CBC be fully funded by the parliamentary appropriation at some point in time.

I was glad to hear from Mrs. Henley. I completely agree that we need to have the mandate review for the CBC. We're very much looking forward to the work of the advisory committee in the next little while, to see how we can get the CBC to be the best it can be and make the most out of that parliamentary appropriation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you.

Now I'm going to the Bloc Québécois and Martin Champoux for six minutes.