We will try this again, Mr. Speaker.
What we are looking at in Bill C-18 is legislation that would provide more transparency and ultimately more accountability than we saw in Australia. Canadians as a whole, in all regions of the country, desire to see fact-based news reported. One of the ways in which we can ensure that takes place is to support Bill C-18.
On one hand, we had every political entity inside this chamber in the last federal election say that it supported that form of legislation. The good news is that, like so many other platform issues in an election, the Government of Canada has brought forward legislation that would fulfill yet another commitment to Canadians, so it should be no surprise. Part of that commitment is to see this legislation ultimately pass. That is why the Minister of Heritage was here about half an hour ago, talking about why it was important that we bring in time allocation to get this legislation passed.
I would appeal in particular to my Conservative friends to recognize the true value of the legislation and suggest to them that times have changed. When I was first elected as a parliamentarian a few years back, I can remember walking back into the Manitoba legislature in 1988 and looking into the press gallery. We have a press gallery up here, but it is not very often that we actually see members of the press in there. Having said that, when I first walked into the Manitoba legislature during a question period, the press gallery was packed. We would have two cameras from CBC. We would have CKND there. We would have CTV. We would have at least three reporters from the Winnipeg Free Press and from the Winnipeg Sun and even some rural media. There were not that many chairs, and often we would see media personalities standing. When I left the Manitoba legislature a number of years ago, prior to coming here, we might get one or two members of the media sitting in the gallery.
We need to recognize the number of local news outlets that have been lost through print media, radio and television. Our communities really miss community-based reporting of local news. At large companies, including CTV, CBC and other major media outlets, there have been cutbacks. We should all be concerned. We are a parliamentary democracy in Canada. Our system is very much dependent on having a healthy, modern media industry. I have used the word, as many of my colleagues have. When we talk about a modern industry, it is absolutely critical that it be fact-based. That is why more and more we are seeing a sense of urgency in getting this type of legislation put before the House and into committee, and ultimately coming back and getting the royal assent that is necessary in order to make it the law of the land.
The legislation would ensure that there is a free, independent press that is able to enhance our democratic values, and it would ensure that there is a certain element of fact-based news that we see when we look at Facebook and YouTube and those high-tech world-leading giants, if I can put it that way.
Let us compare yesterday to today, yesterday being a number of years ago, and the advertising that would have taken place. I will use the Winnipeg Free Press as an example and the advertising dollars it would have generated during the 1990s. We can compare that to the amount of advertising required today. Whether it is print, radio or TV, it is advertising dollars that generate the revenue to provide opportunities for those companies to pay their employees, from the people delivering, publishing or printing the papers to the journalists, the ones writing the stories and providing the editorials. There has been a massive loss of advertising revenue not only by our major newspapers, but also our community-based newspapers. If we look at rural communities and municipalities versus larger urban centres, we have seen a reduction in what I would suggest is reliable, fact-based reporting because of the loss of revenue.
Where we have seen an explosion, on the other hand, is through the Internet. It has been cited, for example, that Facebook and Google consume somewhere in the neighbourhood of 80% of what goes into advertising. Are the reporters and investigative journalists receiving any sort of real financial compensation for the work they are doing to create and provide the fact-based stories that come from Internet giants Google and Facebook? If we do a Google search or look at Facebook, we see these streams that incorporate news broadcasts. Is there fair compensation being provided?
The government and, based on the last federal election, I would argue all members recognize that there is a deficiency and that fair compensation is not being provided. It is the Government of Canada that is in the best position to ensure that there is a higher sense of awareness and that we have an industry that is being protected. It goes much further than the issue of jobs. It is an industry that we cannot afford to lose or neglect. I would suggest there is an obligation for us to protect it and do what we can to enhance it. When we read through Bill C-18, that is what we will find it would do. The sooner it gets through the House of Commons and becomes law, the sooner we will enable many news agencies to have the opportunity to have fair discussions and negotiations with companies such as Google and YouTube. That is why I believe it is so critical.
In the questions and answers the Minister of Canadian Heritage provided earlier today, he was talking in part about the number of people we are losing in that industry. I do not have the actual numbers, but I could speculate in terms of salaries. I suspect the average salary in that industry has modestly increased and I would not be surprised if, in many ways, it has decreased at a time when, as the Internet explodes, there is an even higher demand for reliable news.
I know how important it is. On a weekly basis, I go to a local restaurant where every so often a certain gentleman would come by, and I could tell what paper he was reading by the criticism he was providing. One day I suggested to him that he should broaden his reading and share other stories that were being published. Interestingly, he never did show up again. I suspect it was because he had been looking at the broader media and reading what was being published by some of those agencies that we have grown to trust over the years. There is a high sense of accountability for Global, CTV and CBC, and newspapers both nationally and locally. When they appear in newsfeeds, whether it is on Facebook or YouTube or in whatever format, it does make a difference.
This government is not going to be intimidated in any fashion by the tech giants of the world. We want to ensure that the industry is protected, and we need to put everyone on a more level and fairer playing field. There needs to be proper compensation to our media outlets that are being tapped into in order to foster greater profits for those high-tech world companies, and in short, that is exactly what Bill C-18 would do: It would put in place a process that would enable negotiation and a much higher sense of fairness. It would protect our news industry as we modernize and continue to move forward.
I encourage all members not only to support the legislation before us but also to support its passage so that it can get royal assent possibly as early as the end of June.
