Evidence of meeting #105 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 platforms.
A recording is available from Parliament.
10 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Okay.
I'm sorry, Martin.
Go ahead. You have two and a half minutes, please.
10 a.m.
Bloc
Martin Champoux Bloc Drummond, QC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Listening to the answers, testimony and presentations of the witnesses today, and further to the discussions the committee began some time ago, I think that the idea of a fund, as we proposed back in 2019, was perhaps a better idea.
Perhaps it would have been more urgent to regulate hate content, the proliferation and freedom of movement of hate content, disinformation and misinformation on online platforms. We may have come at the issue the wrong way around, and now here we are with companies that are armed for combat, to say the least. The digital giants don't want to be regulated, and they have organized their opposition.
I feel an extremely difficult challenge lies ahead, and that is to adopt hate content regulations. It's crucial, but I think we're getting into something that's going to be extremely difficult.
Mr. Palmer, earlier you mentioned a fund that could ensure the viability of news in the regions, in media wastelands where coverage is very hard to maintain. How do you see this fund being established? Who's going to pay into it?
Yesterday, at another committee meeting, Rachel Curran of Meta said that news could come back on Meta's platforms as long as there's no regulation. I think that's not really acceptable, unless Meta makes a significant financial contribution.
Do you agree that online undertakings that share news content should contribute to the fund you mentioned to preserve news in the regions?
10 a.m.
President, Internet Society Canada Chapter
Frankly, I think you're right that the fund would be the best way to deal with the problems that Canadian journalism has at the moment. I think the most significant point is that it needs to be funded across the board.
Why did we focus only on Google and Facebook? Why did we ignore other platforms? Why did we not require that the levy be broader?
I think the whole business of privately negotiated deals fell apart on scrutiny. I think there needs to be a legally imposed levy on those who propagate further news access in Canada, and it should go into an independent fund.
10:05 a.m.
Liberal
10:05 a.m.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thanks to all our witnesses today. You've given us a lot of important material to digest. We greatly appreciate your expertise.
I wanted to go to Mr. Vranken and Mr. Riekeles. I haven't asked you a question yet.
I wanted to ask you two questions.
First off, does it make any sense at all that Canada subsidizes—indirectly—Meta and Google to the tune of over a billion dollars a year? This is something that is inexplicable—that we pay businesses to advertise on these two platforms—given the size and scope of the companies.
Secondly, what are the suggestions that you can give us in terms of tackling online harms legislation? The government has been very slow to introduce it. It is absolutely critical given the outbreak of far-right extremism that we're seeing and the far-right extremist violence provoked often by the malgorithms that we're talking about. What are the lessons learned that we can take in Canada to ensure we have legislation that actually combats these online harms?
I'm starting with Mr. Vranken.
10:05 a.m.
Researcher, Corporate Europe Observatory
Many thanks for the questions.
I don't feel very well placed to answer the first question because I'm not familiar with the billion dollars in subsidies going to Meta, as I don't know the Canadian situation.
I will go into the second question on online harms and how to prevent them. The EU has now put a framework in place called the Digital Services Act, where these online platforms should meet a moderation policy and that moderation policy should be transparent. It should be, to a certain extent, accessible by internal independent audits—
10:05 a.m.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Thank you. I'm sorry to cut you off.
I'm going to have to ask Mr. Riekeles the same question. I only have two and a half minutes.
10:05 a.m.
Liberal
10:05 a.m.
Associate Director, European Policy Centre, As an Individual
May I simply ask which of the two questions he wants me to answer.
10:05 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
You don't have a lot of time to answer both. You only have 30 seconds, so please answer quickly.
Thank you.
10:05 a.m.
Associate Director, European Policy Centre, As an Individual
The quick answer is to say that I don't have detailed knowledge of the funds compensation that's being set up in Canada. It's not for me to comment.
What I can say in terms of payments to publishers in Europe is that it was addressed through copyright reform that created an ancillary right, which was essentially about creating a market. In a sense, if you give a property right to publishers over how content is used online, then you give them a position to negotiate.
How has that worked? I think it has led to negotiations in most cases, but it is also very clear that, in most of these situations, the rapport de force or the relative strength is extremely unbalanced. I think what a lot of publishers have come to experience is that they sit down around the table with Google or with Meta and ask, “How are we going to get paid for our content that you are using?” The answer is, “Of course we're going to pay you, but why don't you buy this service, that service and also this service and be part of this ad platform” for all that's worth.
10:05 a.m.
Associate Director, European Policy Centre, As an Individual
In the end, it's a very unbalanced negotiation.
10:05 a.m.
Liberal
December 14th, 2023 / 10:05 a.m.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Mr. Palmer, I want to come back to our earlier conversation. You got cut off, unfortunately, in the questioning.
Then, Mr. Hatfield, I'm going to bring this question over to you with regard to an open Internet.
Mr. Palmer and Mr. Hatfield, there's a lot of conversation with regard to regulation around the Internet, of course, and I think a desire to protect people. My question is, what are the dangers when the government involves itself in protecting people from certain ideologies, certain beliefs, certain values or certain exchanges of information?
When the government determines that it is up to it to “protect” people from these things, what happens to us as a free society and to the exchange of ideas in innovation and creativity going forward?
10:10 a.m.
President, Internet Society Canada Chapter
The question you pose is a profound one, and I'm not sure that I can grow to the size and scope of it.
The question really is, what is the boundary between awful and lawful? There's a lot of crap on the Internet. There's a lot of misogyny, etc., but is that speech unlawful? Is it illegal? Should government be suppressing it?
I don't have all the answers on this, but certainly there's always a danger when we suppress speech—and particularly when government, which has an interest in how people speak and, particularly, speak about it, is empowered to suppress elements of speech—and that's regrettable.
It's a tremendously difficult balance to find, but it's a tremendously dangerous line on which government has to be respectful of rights.
Thank you.
10:10 a.m.
Executive Director, OpenMedia
It's a fair question.
I think lawful but awful speech is a lot of what many people experience daily on platforms that they don't like. There's always going to be quite a bit of that speech, and you really can't regulate away things that are functionally dog whistles, because people will just find new ways of expressing that.
When we're looking at how platforms influence the problem, we need to look at to what extent they reflect society and to what extent they are amplifying or driving some of these things. That's where greater researcher access to figure out the question of that is really important, but it's critical that we don't create a very censorious situation where the government indirectly forces platforms to remove a ton of lawful speech.
There's the potential for really critical social mobilization and conversations to be affected if we set out poorly designed regulation.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Thank you.
Mr. Elgie, I'll return to you here for a moment with regard to Bill C-18 and the impact that it is having. Now, I should clarify, because Bill C-18.... Meta opted out because they're no longer carrying news links. Google had a few demands of the government and, of course, the government entered into a backroom and created a deal with them, so we now have a Google deal. We don't have Bill C-18 being upheld by anyone.
Given the Google deal for $100 million, how does something like this work to the disadvantage of innovative, new, local, independent or cultural media outlets?
10:10 a.m.
Chief Executive Officer, Village Media Inc.
It's difficult to answer that in the absence of final regulations and an understanding of how the funds will be distributed, especially, as mentioned earlier, when you look at the scope of the organizations that are involved.
I would go back to saying that certainly the evacuation of Meta from the industry will, without question, disadvantage many small, start-up and independent publishers, because this was, in many cases, the on-ramp to their developing audiences, and it was a very efficient way in which to do that.
As well, with these kinds of programs and funding, because people have to apply to receive it, it tends to disadvantage, again, the start-ups, because people who have been in the industry, including us, will be advantaged because we get access to those funds very quickly, whereas sometimes the process can otherwise take years, potentially.
I do believe that the outcome will disadvantage start-ups in particular.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
10:10 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Thank you very much.
We have bells, for the committee's information. I think that we have another 25 minutes before the vote. We have one more questioner, and that's Mr. Noormohamed for five minutes.
Do I have unanimous consent for him to ask his questions?
10:10 a.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.