Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) speaks at the U.S. Capitol on June 21, in Washington, DC. Ms. Klobuchar is urging Canada’s political leaders to stand their ground against pressure tactics from Google and Meta over the recently passed Bill C-18.Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images
The U.S. senator leading the push in Washington for a new American law that would force Google and Meta to pay news publishers says political leaders must stand firm in response to pressure tactics such as threats to block links to Canadian news stories.
Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar introduced and co-sponsors the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act, which was approved in June by the Senate judiciary committee. It still requires support of the full Senate, the House of Representatives and ultimately President Joe Biden.
The U.S. legislation is similar to Canada’s Online News Act, which Parliament approved last month and is scheduled to become law within six months after the drafting of regulatory details.
In a statement to The Globe and Mail, Ms. Klobuchar said Google and Meta’s tactics must be challenged.
“We’ve seen this show before. It is part and parcel of the tech playbook,” she said in response to a request for comment on the companies’ plans to block Canadian news.
“Of course monopolies will fight us every step of the way,” she said, “but we won’t back down – we must stand up for small businesses and competition while ensuring people have access to their local news.”
Ms. Klobuchar’s bill has 15 additional co-sponsors, including seven Republicans and one Independent. Senior South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham is among the Republicans who have signed on to co-sponsor the bill.
There is also bipartisan support at the state level. A bill called The California Journalism Preservation Act was approved in the California state assembly last month by a vote of 55-6. The legislation, which also shares similarities with the Canadian law, will now be debated in the state Senate.
Both Google and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, are headquartered in California. Like in Canada, the two U.S. bills have generated heated debate in public-policy circles as to whether they will ultimately help or hurt the news industry.
Ariel Pollock, a spokesperson for the U.S. embassy in Ottawa, said Washington is monitoring the Canadian debate to assess its potential impact south of the border.
“We are continuing to watch developments around the implementation of Bill C-18 and encourage Canada to consider U.S. stakeholder input as it implements this bill,” she said in an e-mail Monday.
United States Trade Representative Katherine Tai expressed concern last year that the bill could discriminate against U.S. businesses.
Support for both bills in the U.S. from across the political spectrum is at odds with the Canadian political reaction to the Online News Act. The Liberal government’s bill was supported by the NDP and the Bloc Québécois, but strongly opposed by the Official Opposition Conservative Party.
Google announced on June 29 that it intends to block Canadian news on its platform. It also said it will participate in discussions with the Canadian government about regulations, which leaves open the possibility of a last-minute arrangement. Meta had previously said it will block access to Canadian news as it believes the legislation is not workable.
Both companies have also said they will wind down existing voluntary deals with Canadian news organizations, including The Globe, related to compensation for use of news content. Meta is also ending a journalism fellowship program with The Canadian Press newswire that has funded about 30 positions for early-career journalists since 2020.
The companies’ tactics are generating international headlines. Large numbers of news organizations worldwide are trimming staff or shutting down entirely, which is putting pressure on policy makers to respond.
The Canadian and American bills are widely supported by major news publishers, but have been criticized by groups representing smaller news organizations.
LION Publishers, representing about 450 smaller publishers that are mostly in the U.S. but also in Canada, has said that the California bill would incentivize publishers to produce “cheap clickbait” and fail to support quality local journalism. Similar concerns have been expressed about the Canadian bill by the Independent Online News Publishers of Canada, which has some overlapping membership with LION.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has strongly criticized the government’s handling of the issue, stating that Liberal efforts to support journalism have essentially backfired and will do more harm than good.
“Big Tech will now pay less for Canadian news after your law,” he said in a recent tweet directed at Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez. “They have now stopped funding journalism. And you have made news disappear. The opposite of what you promised.”
Mr. Rodriguez recently told The Globe that he was surprised to see Google and Meta announce plans to block Canadian news. He speculated that it could be a negotiating strategy. He also said the companies are trying to send a message to other countries that are considering similar policies.
The Canadian law and the U.S. bills all take inspiration from Australia’s News Media and Digital Platforms Bargaining Code, which took effect in March, 2021.
The premise of the Australian code is that there is a power imbalance between large platforms and news publishers seeking compensation for news that appears on those sites. The law gives a regulator – the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) – the power to mediate disagreements. However it strongly encourages platforms and publishers to reach deals outside of the code, which so far has occurred in each case.
Australian politicians faced intense lobbying from Google and Meta not to adopt the law. Both companies threatened to block news in Australia and Facebook briefly did so before reversing course.
Researchers in Australia have since found that the rules appear to be generating a significant hiring boost in the journalism sector.
An April, 2023 report by The Australia Institute found that job ads for journalists increased by 46 per cent after the new rules were implemented. The report said it is hard to provide specific numbers as most media outlets have not disclosed the terms of their agreements with Google and Meta.
By November, 2022, Google had reached 22 commercial agreements representing 183 media mastheads in Australia and Meta had reached agreements with 13 news businesses, the report said.
Two large media outlets did disclose hiring details. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation said the deals led to an additional 50 journalist roles and the Guardian Australia increased the size of its newsroom from 100 to 150 journalists.
Rod Sims, who chaired the Australian regulator from 2011 until 2022, told The Globe in an e-mail exchange that he’s hopeful Google and Meta will ultimately back down from their threats, as they did in Australia.
“Google and Meta have much at stake here so I am not surprised that they are adopting aggressive tactics,” said Prof. Sims, who teaches at the Crawford School of Public Policy at The Australian National University.
“In Australia, they backed down on their threats and agreed to pay media companies for their content after some very minor concessions from the Australian government that did not alter the excellent outcomes achieved,” he said. “I hope something similar happens in Canada.”
Prof. Sims said Canada may need to adjust its rules to ensure that if Google and Meta do block news, they would have to block all news, not just news from Canada.
“It is very hard for Google or Meta to provide their services without drawing on any news at all,” he said.
EDMONTON – The legendary k.d. lang got the band back together at the Canadian Country Music Association awards show.
Lang teamed up with the Reclines for the first time in 35 years to belt out “Big Boned Gal” from their last album together in 1989.
Clad in a blue and green western-style dress, lang strut across the stage in Edmonton to embody the “big boned gal from southern Alberta.”
The awards show saw Alberta’s MacKenzie Porter and Ontario’s Josh Ross take home hardware for being best female and male artists of the year.
Ross also won entertainer of the year and single of the year for “Trouble.”
Ontario artist Jade Eagleson won album of the year for “Do It Anyway.”
The James Barker Band from Woodville, Ont., won fans’ choice and group of the year.
During their acceptance speech, frontman Barker hinted at new music and a possible tour in 2025.
Ross says he and his band play roughly 150 shows every year and are never home, but says taking home entertainer of the year made the hard work worth it.
Porter won for female artist of the year and top video for “Chasing Tornadoes.”
The female artist win ends the five-year streak of Tenille Townes being awarded the coveted hardware.
Porter had been nominated seven times previously for the award in the past decade but hadn’t won until now.
The artist from Medicine Hat, Alta., says it takes a lot of hard work and hustle to succeed as a female in the country music industry and gave a shout out to her fellow singers and her newborn daughter.
Joining the two artists in the winners’ circle was Ontario singer-songwriter Owen Riegling, who won for breakthrough artist of the year.
The show began with American artist and co-host Thomas Rhett being dubbed an honorary Canadian by Edmonton Oilers players Corey Perry and Leon Draisaitl.
Rhett donned an Oilers jersey that was gifted to him by the pair.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 14, 2024.
EDMONTON – Ontario country artist Jade Eagleson has won album of the year at the 2024 Canadian Country Music Association Awards in Edmonton.
The singer from Bailieboro, Ont., was up for six awards alongside Alberta’s MacKenzie Porter.
Eagleson took home album of the year for “Do It Anyway” and says he’s thankful to his wife and management team for helping him reach the level he’s at.
The James Barker Band from Woodville, Ont., also won fans’ choice and group of the year at the award show, held in Edmonton.
During their acceptance speech, frontman Barker hinted at new music and a possible tour in 2025.
Another Ontario crooner, Josh Ross, has taken home a trio of awards, receiving entertainer of the year, male artist of the year and single of the year.
He says he and his band play roughly 150 shows every year and are never home, but says taking home entertainer of the year makes the hard work worth it.
Porter took home female artist of the year, ending the five-year streak of Tenille Townes being awarded the coveted hardware.
Porter had been nominated seven times previously for the award in the past decade but hadn’t won until tonight.
The artist from Medicine Hat, Alta., says it takes a lot of hard work and hustle to succeed as a female in the country music industry and gave a shout out to her fellow singers and her newborn daughter.
Joining the two artists in the winners’ circle was Ontario singer-songwriter Owen Riegling, who won for breakthrough artist of the year.
The show began with American artist and co-host Thomas Rhett being dubbed an honorary Canadian by Edmonton Oilers players Corey Perry and Leon Draisaitl.
Rhett donned an Oilers jersey that was gifted to him by the pair.
The return of k.d. lang and the Reclines was expected to be a highlight of the show.
The appearance will mark the first time the Alberta songstress has teamed up with the band in 35 years and is tied to lang’s induction into the Canadian Country Music Hall of Fame.
The awards show is back in Alberta’s capital for the first time since 2014. It was held in Hamilton last year and in Calgary in 2022.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 14, 2024.
VANDERHOOF, B.C. – British Columbia Conservatives are promising changes they say will bring more stability to the province’s struggling forest industry.
Leader John Rustad announced his plan for the sector a week before the official launch of the provincial election campaign, saying a Conservative government would do away with stumpage fees paid when timber is harvested and instead put a tax on the final products that are produced.
Rustad said Saturday that under a provincial Conservative government, a small fee may be charged upfront, but the bulk would come at the end of the process, depending on what type of product is created.
He also promised to review how wildfires are managed, as well as streamline the permit process and review what he calls the province’s “uncompetitive cost structure.”
“British Columbia is by far the highest cost producers of any jurisdiction in North America. We need to be able to drive down those costs, so that our forest sector can actually be able to do the reinvestment, to be able to create the jobs and make sure that they’re still there to be able to support our communities,” he said.
The governing New Democrats meanwhile, say eliminating stumpage fees would inflame the softwood lumber dispute with the United States and hurt forestry workers.
In a statement issued by the NDP, Andrew Mercier, the party’s candidate in Langley-Willowbrook, said Rustad failed to support the industry when he was in government under the former BC Liberals.
“Not only will Rustad’s old thinking and recycled ideas fail to deliver, his proposal to eliminate stumpage would inflame the softwood lumber dispute — punishing forestry workers and communities,” Mercier said, accusing Rustad of ignoring the complexity of the challenges facing the industry.
The softwood lumber dispute between the U.S. and Canada stretches back decades. In August, the U.S. Department of Commerce nearly doubled duties on softwood lumber.
International Trade Minister Mary Ng has said Canada has taken steps to launch two legal challenges under the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement.
Rustad said a provincial Conservative government would push hard to get a deal with the United States over the ongoing dispute “whether it’s with the rest of Canada or by itself.”
He said his party’s proposed changes are in the name of bringing “stability” and “hope” to the industry that has seen multiple closures of mills in rural communities over the last several years.
Most recently, Canfor Corp. decided to shutter two northern British Columbia sawmills earlier this month, leaving hundreds of workers unemployed by the end of the year.
According to the United Steelworkers union, Canfor has closed 10 mills in the province since November 2011, including nine in northern B.C.
Jeff Bromley, chair of the United Steelworkers wood council, said Saturday the idea of changes in favour of taxing the final product has been floated in the past.
He said the finer details of the Conservative plan will be important, but that the system needs to be improved and “new ideas are certainly something I’d be willing to entertain.”
“Something needs to happen, or the industry is just going to bleed and wither away and be a shadow of its former self,” Bromley said.
“Politics aside, if (Rustad) can come up with a policy that enables my members to work, then I would be supportive of that. But then I’m supportive of any government that would come up with policies and fibre for our mills to run. Period.”
When Canfor announced its latest closures, Forests Minister Bruce Ralston said the sector was a “foundational part” of the province and the current NDP government would work to support both local jobs and wood manufacturing operations.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 14, 2024
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