Evidence of meeting #83 for Canadian Heritage in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was money.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
Well, yes. We have to look at the possibilities of providing more support to those small players, but also, as I said, there are programs they can access.
Conservative
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
They're programs. It's not a subsidy in the sense of a subsidy—
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
Yes, it's a subsidy. When you provide a program and you don't advertise, it's a subsidy.
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
There are different programs to support them. That's because their work is extremely important.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
I agree. It's really critical. I have about 13, and most of them in my riding are independent—
Liberal
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
They're not represented by anybody. They got zero out of whatever funds. It's not coming out of the $600 million. They got zero out of that $600 million. It's a big zero. Nothing. Those 13 got nothing.
The big tech guys haven't contacted them to give them any money out of the $300 million either. They admitted that here, and I've contacted them—
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
The $600 million is not available for the big tech companies. This is only for our regular—
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
The 13 weekly papers in my riding got zero. Do you understand? It was zero. They didn't get it, so who got it? Who got the $600 million?
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
Those programs are not accessible to the big tech giants. They're not for them.
Liberal
Conservative
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
I understand, Mr. Shields. It wasn't yours, but think about the media, big or small, in different regions—radio, television and papers. They are getting some money through those programs.
Conservative
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
You're telling me that your 13 papers are not getting it. I fully understand that.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
No. They're independent. They don't belong to groups. They're not getting it.
That's what you fundamentally have missed, time and time again over the years. You don't get it, and that's why they're going down.
Liberal
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
Mr. Shields, the $600 million is going to local media.
One of the benefits of Bill C-18 is collective bargaining. You can have a lot of them, even if they are not represented by anyone, get together. That is what they have done in Australia, and the small media in Australia, proportionally, got more than the big ones, proportionally speaking.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
Most of that money, the $300 million, has already been negotiated away. We heard from your officials that 75% to 80% is already gone. It's already been negotiated away.
Liberal