Canadian Heritage Memorandum, December 8, 2020, ATIP A-2020-00498

Canadian Heritage Memorandum, December 8, 2020, ATIP A-2020-00498

Bill C-10

Agir Pour La Liberte D'Expression by Deb Ransom https://flic.kr/p/2m7BZ4U Public Domain

The Conservative Election Platform: Freedom of Expression Commitment Tainted By Support for Payments for Links, Restrictions on Fair Dealing

The Conservative Party released its election platform yesterday, providing a lengthy document that covers a myriad of policy issues. From a digital policy perspective, there are positions sprinkled throughout the document, covering everything from a new innovation policy (an issue that the Liberals de-emphasized over the past two years and the Conservatives are right to target) to labour rights for gig workers.

On many issues, the reality is the policy platform isn’t all that different from the Liberal government’s approach.

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August 17, 2021 — 18 comments — News
pour un internet libre by g4ll4is https://flic.kr/p/cNtg63 (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Picking Up Where Bill C-10 Left Off: The Canadian Government’s Non-Consultation on Online Harms Legislation

The Canadian government released its plans yesterday for online harms legislation with a process billed as a consultation, but which is better characterized as an advisory notice, since there are few questions, options or apparent interest in hearing what Canadians think of the plans. Instead, the plans led by Canadian […]

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July 30, 2021 — 49 comments — News
Survey says... by Henry Faber https://flic.kr/p/mn6aF (CC BY-NC 2.0)

Reviving Bill C-10: CRTC Re-Opens Data Gathering Plans To Require Disclosures from Internet Streaming Services

Bill C-10 may be dead for now (Senate discussions on returning during the summer will reportedly not include the bill), but CRTC Chair Ian Scott has signalled a willingness to move ahead with Bill C-10-like policies. In fact, even without legislative reform, the CRTC last week announced that it is re-opening its approach to a digital media survey by seeking to expand it to cover foreign streaming services. The decision is notable for several reasons, not the least of which is that the survey would overlap with the data disclosure provisions in Bill C-10 and Scott had previously indicated that he did not believe he had the legislative tools to require data disclosures.

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July 6, 2021 — 13 comments — News
Senator David Adams Richards from the Senate

The Senate Bill C-10 Debate Concludes: “I Don’t Think This Bill Needs Amendments. It Needs a Stake Through the Heart.”

The Senate Bill C-10 debate wrapped up yesterday with several speeches and a vote to send the bill to committee for further study. Given that the Senate declined to approve summer hearings for the bill, the earliest possible time for the study to begin is the week of September 20th. If there is a late summer/early fall election as most observers expect, Bill C-10 will die. Without an election, Bill C-10 will be back for Senate hearings in the fall with many Senators emphasizing the need for a comprehensive study that features the myriad of perspectives that were excluded from the failed House review.

While the debate in the Senate was marked by consistent calls for more study (my recap of day one, day two), the final debate was punctuated by a powerful speech from Senator David Adams Richards. One of Canada’s leading authors, Senator Richards has won the Governor General’s Award for both fiction and non-fiction, the Giller Prize, and is a member of the Order of Canada. Senator Richards, appointed by Prime Minister Trudeau to the Senate in 2017, warns against government or cultural decision makers and the parallels to Bill C-10:

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June 30, 2021 — 13 comments — News
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The CRTC “Will Be Picking Winners and Losers”: A Report on Day Two of the Senate Bill C-10 Debate

In a day that started with Canadian Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault urging the Senate to focus on passing Bill C-10, Senators from across the political spectrum again signalled that they believe that Guilbeault’s bill requires extensive hearings given the flawed legislative approach in the House of Commons and a resulting bill that raises a wide range of policy concerns. Concerns with Bill C-10 were raised by virtually every Senator to speak during yesterday’s debate: Senator Donna Dasko noted that “public confidence is lacking at this point in time” in the bill, Senator Colin Deacon argued that the government has failed to address the core concerns involving privacy and competition, and Senator Pamela Wallin called the bill “reckless” and urged the government “to go back to the drawing board.” Those speeches came on top of the first day of Senate debate in which Senator Dennis Dawson admitted that “everybody recognizes the bill is flawed” and Senator Paula Simons said the bill reminded her of the Maginot Line.

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June 29, 2021 — 10 comments — News
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