44th Parl. 1st Sess.
March 9, 2023 10:00AM
Mr. Speaker, this is the best part. The Leader of the Opposition just said “thank you”, so we know they are doing this just for fundraising purposes. The email goes on to talk about censorship. It talks about the rights of freedom of expression being infringed upon. This is what they said. They know they are not telling the truth. That is a quote from the email. They then, of course, cap off the email by asking to help them kill the bill, and there is a big “donate now” button.
I am wondering if the parliamentary secretary can weigh in on why the Conservatives stand to gain, and what they stand to gain, from all of this misinformation they are spreading.
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Madam Speaker, we oppose all the censorship in the bill, 100% of it. I will repeal all of it. I will let the people decide what they want to see and say on the Internet.
One example is that the government claimed the bill would not affect “user-generated content”, or in plain language, the stuff that everyday people post on their Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and other forms of content made by everybody we know in our neighbourhoods across this country. The Liberals said that it would not affect any of that and even put in an amendment originally in the bill that said worry not, user-generated content would be excluded. Then, in the 11th hour, they reversed their decision because we know that is what they wanted all along.
This was never about protecting Canadian content. They admit that they do not even know what Canadian content is. The bill is about controlling the people. That is what the government is about, and that is why we will defeat the government and repeal the bill.
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Madam Speaker, the Conservative Party is the only party that supports our artists. Without freedom of expression, there can be no art. If there is no freedom of expression, there is no culture. If the other parties want to censor freedom of expression, it is because they want to censor artists.
With regard to profits, I repeat that the bill does nothing to rein in Google, Twitter or Facebook. Under this bill, these web giants will continue to dominate the digital world. If the hon. member wants to end that oligopoly, I would support that and I am ready to discuss it.
However, this bill does not do that. This bill takes power away from audiences and gives officials and politicians in Ottawa the power to control what Canadians see and hear online. That is censorship.
Mr. Alexandre Boulerice: You are the one giving Google an exemption, not to mention the tax gift to Netflix and YouTube.
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Madam Speaker, I thank the leader of the official opposition for his careful articulation and his commitment to killing Bill C-11.
He mentioned the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and how freedom of expression would be eroded by Bill C-11. On the Government of Canada's own website, it says, “The Supreme Court of Canada has maintained that the connection between freedom of expression and the political process is 'perhaps the linchpin' of section 2(b)... Free expression is valued above all as being instrumental to democratic governance.”
My question to the Leader of the Opposition, who is committed to killing this bill, whether now or when he is prime minister, a day I look forward to happening very soon, is why would the Liberal Prime Minister actually want to bring in this type of censorship? Is it because he admires communist dictatorships?
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Madam Speaker, I am going to let Margaret Atwood answer that question. This is what she said. She described the CRTC as “the shadowy body that lurks in the background... They're secret. How many of them are there, or what do they do actually?”
Furthermore, and directly to the member's question, she stated, commenting specifically on this bill, “All you have to do is read some biographies of writers writing in the Soviet Union and the degrees of censorship they had to go through—government bureaucrats. So it is creeping totalitarianism if governments are telling creators what to create.”
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Mr. Speaker, “Whoever controls the media, controls the mind” is a quote from musician Jim Morrison. Bill C-11 aims to do exactly that. This far-overreaching bill gives control to the government to decide what online media is and is not shown to Canadians.
Famed Canadian author Margaret Atwood said it best, “All you have to do is read some biographies of writers writing in the Soviet Union and the degrees of censorship they had to go through - government bureaucrats.... So it is creeping totalitarianism if governments are telling creators what to create.”
Art is subjective. The Liberal government will stop at nothing to control what Canadians see online.
If Bill C-11 passes, it kicks open the door to government censorship, empowering the Liberals to strengthen voices they deem good and silence those they deem bad.
Conservatives trust Canadians to choose what they want to watch online.
Enough is enough. Let us stop with the controlling legislation and kill Bill C-11.
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There is nothing more inclusive than the Internet. It does not matter where we live or what we look like, there is a place for us online, for now, but Bill C-11 jeopardizes this freedom. It jeopardizes this free market.
I can remember walking into a room with online content creators, mom bloggers who had created a community that literally saved the lives of women who were suffering with postpartum, who were suicidal, who were struggling with their mental health. These women were extreme introverts, meaning they otherwise would not have been able to create this medium if there were not able to flip open their computers and write something online that connected them to hundreds, thousands and millions of people, built a community and allowed their voices to be heard.
If we go to the Canadian government website, it states this about competition: “Competition pushes individuals, firms and markets to make the best use of their resources, and to think outside the box to develop new ways of doing business and winning customers. This not only drives productivity up, it also improves our own standard of living.”
Bill C-11 would go after a competitive market that needs zero government interference. Online content creators are making their own destiny. They are building communities. They are raising money for not-for-profits and charities. They are connecting people all over the world. It is a major concern when the government wants to interfere, dictate and control what it thinks people at home should be watching.
Artistry and creation are not a choice. If we ask artists, they will tell us they did not choose it; it chose them. They have to create. It is what fuels them. It is simply who they are.
What someone values as art or great content is completely independent of the consumer. I may love Cat and Nat, two Toronto-based “mompreneurs” who built an empire by creating an online space for moms. They were, for the record, turned away by countless broadcast agencies and had the door slammed in their face multiple times, but because of the free market of the Internet, they were able to build an empire and connect millions of moms. They are from Toronto, Canadian content creators.
What about “Train with Joan”, made by the 70-year-old Cobourg-based woman who transformed her life using physical fitness and now reaches millions of people online? She is the inspiration so many of us need to know that it is never too late to change our mind and body. Would she have been given an opportunity on a broadcast station? Would she have been given the same opportunity that the Internet allowed her to reach the people she reached?
It is called choice. It is called the freedom to find and choose what to watch. Why in the world would we ever want the government to decide what is worthy of being seen and what is not? This is what Bill C-11 would do. It would give the Liberals the control to decide what we see and watch online.
In the online world, we often hear of a term called “organic reach”. This is the ultimate goal for a content creator. A creator puts content online and the free market decides if it is worthy of liking, sharing and commenting. We have already seen organic reach being meddled with by Facebook and other platforms because of paid reach tactics, a play-to-play system, which has caused problems, so why in the world would government want to meddle even further with this system? Why in the world do we want the government to decide what we watch and see?
Jim Morrison said that those who control the media, control the mind. I really want people to think about what this legislation is and why it is being tabled. Famed Canadian author, Margaret Atwood said it best, saying that this is not a problem that needs fixing. She said, “It is creeping totalitarianism if governments are telling creators what to create.”
The approach of how this bill has been managed is awful and simply undemocratic. In the House, for those who do not know, a bill must be approved at all three readings before it is sent to the Senate to be approved and given royal assent. The Senate should be a safeguard for Canadians when major concerns are raised. There were 26 amendments put forth by the Senate. This is a very high number and speaks volumes to the fact that this bill should be thrown out.
What is the point of the Senate and expert testimony if the Liberals refuse to listen? How is this supposed to build trust with Canadians when people are silenced? When people are silenced, that is censorship, and it is our job as elected officials to bring balance to this room, to find the common ground, to listen to both sides.
I will tell the Liberals, as somebody who has a background in broadcasting, the Broadcasting Act one hundred per cent needs to be updated, but this bill is trying to regulate a free market space of the Internet, and there is no place for the government to do that.
Simon Wiesenthal, a famous Nazi hunter and fighter for human rights, said, “Freedom is not a gift from heaven. One must fight for it every day.” The Tour for Humanity bus was here on Parliament Hill yesterday. I had the opportunity to tour it.
Censorship does not work. History has shown us this over and over again. The Liberals have refused to make the policy direction to the CRTC on how the legislation would be implemented public until after the bill is passed. Let us think about that for a second. The Liberals have refused to make the policy direction to the CRTC on how the legislation would be implemented public until after the bill is passed.
If the Liberals main intention is to promote Canadian content, why in the world would they ask us to sign first and ask questions later. This is so sketchy. Why not just tell Canadians now? What are they hiding? Why are they not being transparent?
Critics are furious, and so they should be, because the heritage minister announced a complete rejection of the senators' work that excluded user content from CRTC regulation after he said they would not. Somewhere right now there is a quirky, talented, gifted content creator who has not discovered that they fit somewhere. They have been told no. Maybe they have not found their community. Maybe they have not found their tribe. However, they hit the upload button, and all of a sudden, their world changes and so does that community's world.
There is much that is great about the Internet. For better or worse, it is here. I have to be honest, I am absolutely shocked that the NDP does not see the value of independent, free market content creators who are doing so much good for social justice and all the things they fight for in the House. It is shocking to me that we are having this fight when we are here to elevate voices of Canadians, to give them the freedom to use their voice for good. It makes no sense to me why we are fighting this bill.
I came here with an open mind, with optimism that we are here to elevate voices. This bill is censorship. It makes no sense. I appreciate and agree a hundred per cent that the Broadcasting Act needs to be updated, but this bill is not achieving that. Its intent is to control online content.
I will end with this: Enough is enough. Stop with the controlling legislation, and please, kill Bill C-11.
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Madam Speaker, since the 1970s, the Government of Canada has regulated television broadcasters and radio broadcasters. When people turn on the radio, a certain amount of the content that they listen to has to be Canadian content. People may agree or disagree with those rules, but I have never heard it characterized as censorship.
I wonder if my hon. colleague down the way would consider those rules around Canadian content, which we have had since before I was born, to be censorship.
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Madam Speaker, having worked for a Canadian broadcasting company as I did for 12 years, I understand Canadian content. I understand that the Broadcasting Act needs to be updated, and I stated that clearly in my speech. However, this bill would not do that. There is an unintended intention here to control the Internet. This is a massive problem to society. That is what we are speaking about. Therefore, absolutely, that is censorship.
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Madam Speaker, I feel as though we are in a space where we are talking past each other, because nothing I am hearing about this bill being about censorship makes any sense when I read the bill. We have a Broadcasting Act, and we would now be equalizing some of the playing field, so that Canadian writers and Canadian screenwriters are not losing out because of the online streaming from the big producers of Hollywood content, and sometimes Canadian content. All I can ask is—
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Madam Speaker, we are here today talking about the Liberals' online censorship bill, Bill C-11. That is what this is. It is an attempt by government to meddle in the leisure time and the cultural and social education that Canadians have. Sometimes, under the Liberals' proposal, Canadians would have to pay for it. Canadians will subscribe to services and pay for their own Internet service and the Liberals would decide what they should be watching and what they should not be watching.
It is interesting, but not surprising after eight years of the Liberal government, that it is on full display now for Canadians that it is a government that wants to control what Canadians see and control what Canadians think.
This is a theme we have seen over the last eight years with a Prime Minister who is always looking to silence his critics and who is also looking to discredit those individuals who have the reputation, who are able to hold him to account. A few obvious examples comes to mind. We will first talk about media.
The Prime Minister has said on more than one occasion that stories that have appeared in mainstream media like The Globe and Mail are false, that they are fake news or misinformation. Then it comes to light, as was the case in the SNC-Lavalin scandal where the Prime Minister was found to have used his position to interfere in the criminal prosecution of his friends, that the story in The Globe and Mail was correct.
We must not let that get in the way of a good cover-up from the government. It wants to be able to control the narrative, even when there are members of the King's Privy Council who push back against the government and push back against the Prime Minister. Instead of taking that advice, that sober second thought, what did the Prime Minister do? In the case of Canada's first female indigenous attorney general, Hon. Jody Wilson-Raybould, when she spoke truth to power to the Prime Minister, he fired her. He kicked her out of cabinet. When another eminent Canadian, a minister of the Queen's Privy Council, Dr. Jane Philpott, spoke out on that issue, he kicked her out of cabinet too.
Canadians are best served when they get truth and honesty, and not when we have a government that is looking to exert control. That is the pattern we have seen with the government. When we are hearing from Canadians and from experts that this would affect what Canadians are able to watch and see online, we should take notice. It should give the government pause, but instead, what is it doing? It is dismissing its critics and saying it is misinformation. We have seen that pattern before.
When the Senate, Canada's chamber of sober second thought, brought forward amendments to protect some of the areas where we have heard the greatest concerns from Canadians with respect to user-generated content, the government dismissed those amendments out of hand. It said it was absolutely not going to do that, but not to worry as the bill does not affect user-generated content.
Why would the government defeat those amendments at committee and why would it refuse those amendments from the Senate? It is because, make no mistake, Bill C-11 would regulate and censor what people see. It would make the government, the Prime Minister through his Minister of Canadian Heritage and through the CRTC that reports to him, the regulator of what we can see online.
It would also censor what one can say. When I say the bill would censor, I mean the government and the Prime Minister, through his Minister of Canadian Heritage and through the CRTC. They would make sure that homegrown talent would not be able to rise to the top based on its quality.
We have seen countless examples where, against the odds, against media giants and production company giants around the world, not the least of which is the United States, Canadian content has flourished. Digital content of course is at the heart of what a lot of Canadians see and do online. The marketplace of ideas should be a meritocracy, but the government is afraid of that. The Liberals are afraid of that. They want to decide who the winners are and who the losers are, when it should be the consumers. It should be Canadians who get to decide.
We hear a lot about favourite programs that people grew up watching or listening to. No one made them watch it because it was Canadian. If it was quality, Canadians consumed it. Now that there is more content, there are more opportunities for Canadian content to flourish, and that is exactly what is happening.
We have a content creator in my riding, and I am not confused. It is McMullan Appliance and Mattress. Corey McMullan from McMullan Appliance and Mattress, which on a county road in my community, is a viral Internet sensation. He is not making cat videos. He is not doing any crazy stunts. He is talking about fridges, washers, dryers and stoves.
His honesty and his authenticity has caused him to gain global celebrity, and with that has come revenue for his business. He is able to sell products online. People buy them from him online because he talks about it. He is not advertising and he is not paying for advertising, but the innovation, the entertainment value and the character of this gentleman have propelled him to such fame and credibility that folks in my community in southeastern Ontario will take their pickup trucks from North Bay and drive all those hours to my community to buy an appliance from Corey because they trust him.
This type of obviously Canadian content is now going to be subjected to a test by the government, where it will decide if it is Canadian enough. We have heard other speakers talk about productions that are made in Canada, written by Canadians, produced by Canadians and have Canadians who star in them, but they do not meet the standard for Canadian content.
If the Liberal government is not prepared to exempt user-generated content, we need to ask why. Why does it refuse to recognize Canadians should have the freedom to say, to think and to watch whatever they want? I believe in my community and I believe in Canadians. I believe in people like Corey McMullan rising to the top based on that sometimes indefinable quality that Canadians are recognized for around the world. That is why, for a very small population, so many actors of stage and screen, so many people who write and produce, and so many people who create are household names. It is not because the government made people like them. It is because Canadians are extraordinary and we are extraordinary because of our freedoms.
After eight years of the Liberal Prime Minister, Canadians have had enough control. That is why a Conservative government would repeal this bill and that is why we believe we need to kill Bill C-11.
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Madam Speaker, how does my colleague explain the fact that all of Quebec's creators and artists, regardless of their sphere of practice, are eagerly awaiting this bill? If anyone is sensitive to the issue of censorship, it is our creators and artists.
How is it that they are looking forward to us passing Bill C‑11, yet the Conservatives alone see it as censorship?
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