The Senate committee report on news media in Canada has echoed the Canadian Media Guild’s view that Canadians need quality news and information and the federal government must ensure that regulation is in place and resources are available to bolster newsgathering.
The Senate committee recognized the important role that Canadian Press plays in delivering news to Canadians and that public broadcasting is more important than ever. The report calls for a review of the CBC’s mandate and a commitment by the federal government for more realistic and stable funding for Canada’s national public broadcaster. It also notes that the CBC should focus more resources on local news and chastises the CBC’s decision to cut back on local and regional news programming.
“After more than a decade of budget cuts and no clear direction from Ottawa, the CBC has been forced to make some problematic programming decisions in order to stay afloat,” says Lise Lareau, national president of the Guild.
“Unfortunately, the Conservative government recently put off its planned review of the CBC’s mandate, leaving the broadcaster in limbo. The Senate report is a call to the Conservative government to put the mandate review back on the front burner and clarify its real view of the future of the CBC,” Lareau adds.
The Guild is pleased that the Senate committee also dealt with the effects of convergence of media ownership on the diversity of news and information that reaches Canadians. The CMG supports the recommendation that media mergers be subject to the Competition Act.
CMG members have seen the adverse effect of media consolidation and the quest to “streamline” newsgathering between various units of a single media company.
“At Sun TV, for example, this has meant cutting production staff in favour of buying technology and re-running material from the print and web divisions of the Sun group,” Lareau points out. “The gutting of content by media companies does not serve Canadians well and the Senate committee has recognized this fact.”
Click hereto read the Senate committee report.
For more information, contact the Guild (info@cmg.ca) at 416-591-5333 or 1-800-465-4149.