OTTAWA (LifeSiteNews) — The state-funded Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) will join a global “Public Spaces Incubator” initiative to combat online “misinformation” despite recently coming under fire from its Ombudsman for violating its ethics code.
Last Wednesday, the CBC announced it was joining along with European public broadcasters RTBF (Belgium), SRG SSR (Switzerland) and ZDF (Germany) to “to explore new ways for public service media to support citizen engagement and democratic discourse.”
As noted by the CBC, the “Public Spaces Incubator” program’s goal is to take on the “most threatening phenomena of our time,” which it claims is “unfettered online abuse” in the form of misinformation and disinformation.
“Online spaces that are free from disinformation, misinformation, harassment and abuse are near extinction,” CBC president Catherine Tait said.
“The social media environment has splintered into so many echo chambers that exclude diversity of opinion, discourage debate and silence dissent. Now is the time for public service media like CBC/Radio-Canada to play a role in reversing this trend.”
The “Public Spaces Incubator” program will be led by the non-governmental organization New_ Public, which is a project from the University of Texas at Austin and the National Conference on Citizenship.
As for the CBC, it has on multiple occasions come under fire for violating its own ethics code.
The most recent example came last month when it was reported CBC Ombudsman Jack Nagler said the network, which gets over $1 billion a year from the federal government, violated its own ethics code over a 2021 article. The article suggested the nation’s Catholic bishops were not coming through on a promise to raise money for an “Indigenous Reconciliation Fund.”
The CBC was also caught spreading false narratives regarding the Freedom Convoy.
Last March, the broadcaster had to retract a story that falsely claimed most support for the Freedom Convoy came from foreigners.
Tait is currently on a cross-Canada tour aimed to drum up support for the broadcaster, which has been slipping in viewership for the past few years.
In a recent interview with The Globe and Mail, Tait claimed that “there’s a lot of CBC bashing going on – somewhat stoked by the Leader of the Opposition.”
“I think they feel that CBC is a mouthpiece for the Liberal government,” she added.
Conservative Party of Canada leader Pierre Poilievre in recent days blasted Tait for smearing his name with her comments. Poilievre has been adamant that he would defund the CBC should he become Prime Minister.
Poilievre wrote in a recent letter to his supporters about Tait and the CBC: “We need to go around the CBC and other Liberal pamphleteers and get our message out to millions of Canadians.”
The CBC has long been criticized by conservatives over what is said to be a left-wing political bias in its reporting. This accusation of partisanship has become a heated topic in Canada, mostly due to the CBC’s massive reliance on taxpayer funds.
In 2021, the CBC received $1.4 billion from the federal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, accounting for 70 percent of its total revenue.
The whopping sum came after Trudeau’s 2019 election promise that his Liberal government would give legacy media $595 million in federal assistance over four years.