OTTAWA, Ontario (LifeSiteNews) — Despite recent reports indicating Canadians’ trust in legacy media is at an all-time low, the federal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is looking to extend its multi-million-dollar mainstream media bailout beyond its initial 2024 end date.
According to Blacklock’s Reporter, on Tuesday Trudeau’s cabinet signaled it might soon extend its 5-year $595 million bailout of the mainstream media, an initiative which was supposed to expire in March of 2024. The suggestion comes shortly after a September 6 executive order shows that Trudeau’s cabinet appointed press lobbyist Bob Cox – who was involved in calling for the bailouts in the first place – to the Independent Advisory Board on Eligibility for Journalism Tax Measures.
The board is tasked with taking publishers’ subsidy applications for final approval, which must be given by the Minister of Revenue. According to the notice, Cox will be holding on to “office during pleasure for a term of two years.”
Cox, when he was the chair of the Canadian Newspaper Association, was successful in getting the subsidies for media, declaring during 2019 hearings of the House of Commons finance committee, “We will have to save ourselves.”
He claimed at the time that a five-year bailout was an “appropriate period of time for the transition because of course, there will be news outlets, newspapers, that fail the transition, and you can’t give them forever.”
When Cox was the publisher of the Winnipeg Free Press, his share of subsidies was about $1 million per year.
Overall, the federal government subsidizes legacy media in Canada to the tune of over $1 billion per year.
In late 2018, Trudeau promised that his Liberal government would give legacy media, including the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), an extra $595 million in federal assistance over the next five years in an attempt to save the failing industry.
Per its 2020-2021 annual report, the CBC receives about $1.24 billion in public funding every year, which is about 70 percent of its revenue.
Trudeau’s subsidy program pays newspapers about 25 percent in payroll rebates, which equals roughly $13,750 per newsroom employee. Publications also get a 15 percent tax credit for all their subscribers.
Despite the liberal use of tax dollars to fund media outlets, recent research from Canada’s Public Health Agency shows that most Canadians have an exceptionally low level of trust in both the federal government and mainstream media.
Testimony from an April 27, 2023, Senate transport and communications committee meeting revealed that Department of Canadian Heritage managers admitted the bailout program did not save any jobs, nor help legacy newspapers.
“We have seen a significant decline in journalism,” testified Thomas Ripley, associate assistant deputy minister.
Further adding fuel to the fire, the CBC, which gets the most bailout money from the government, has been rife with controversy as of late.
In May of this year, former CBC journalist Marianne Klowak shockingly revealed that reporters were stopped from being able to cover stories critical of COVID vaccines and lockdowns, and were instead encouraged to push government “propaganda.”
Klowak had already revealed in June of 2022 that the CBC deliberately skewed its reporting on COVID-19 inoculations.
Other CBC reporters have also left over what they see as biased COVID news coverage.
In January 2022, journalist Tara Henley quit the state broadcaster and wrote a scathing piece in which she said that “Those of us on the inside know just how swiftly – and how dramatically – the politics of the public broadcaster have shifted.”