Rogers “not putting a dime” in middle tier news market: Conservative MP

Community-owned television outlets “are not producing local news that meet high journalistic standards,” and the Online Streaming Act should be amended to ensure sustainable funding for local news, a Rogers Communications Inc. executive told the House of Commons’ Heritage committee as the company defended the impact its merger with Shaw Communications Inc. will have on local news. Rogers president of Sports and Media, Colette Watson, made the comments Wednesday at a meeting studying the effects of the merger on local news, where Conservative MP Kevin Waugh accused the company of “not putting a dime into the middle markets” that will feel the effect of the merger. Watson said that the acquisition will not affect Canadians’ access to “significant amounts” of local news or Rogers’ commitment or material production of that news. “Shaw does not own any local television or radio stations, which means the transaction will not result in any further consolidation within Canada's television and radio industry, nor will it reduce competition,” Watson said. Watson noted that the transaction will affect Corus Entertainment Inc.’s GlobalTV stations because the company will no longer be vertically integrated with Shaw and will therefore no longer be able to access local expression funds. At last month’s committee meeting on the topic, not-for-profit community news associations raised concerns that GlobalTV’s independent status will further impact local news because it will seek $13 million in funding from the Independent Local News Fund (ILNF), which will effectively cut the fund in half. “We've listened to the committee's earlier discussions and share its concern regarding the health of local news. The long term viability of local news is indeed in question. But this transaction is not responsible for that. In fact the health of local news would likely be much worse without vertical integration,” Watson argued. Conservative MP Kevin Waugh said Rogers “cherry picked the Vancouvers, the Calgarys, the big cities” and are “not putting a dime” into middle tier stations run by GlobalTV in areas like Regina, Sask., Saskatoon, Sask., Kelowna, B.C., Lethbridge, Alta. “You're putting a lot of money – you claim you are – but you're not in those markets,” he said. Watson argued that GlobalTV is “a top station group” in Western Canada and its annual news budget of $120 million exceeds CityTV’s news budget “by close to $100 million a year.” “If they can't run those news operations with that amount of money, we should be having a different type of discussion,” she said. She added that GlobalTV must still provide locally relevant and reflective news programming in all the markets it serves as stipulated in its broadcasting licence and, therefore, redirecting the $13 million in funding it receives from Shaw will not have a material impact on its news operations or levels of service. “I would refute to you that $100 million isn't a lot for eight or nine Global stations to give local news. So I can see the flag going up on this sale,” Waugh said. Watson said it is up to the committee to ensure that Bill C-11, the Online Streaming Act, is properly amended to ensure sustainable funding for local news. “The current regulatory framework does not ensure local news is sufficiently funded,” she said. “Unfortunately, the CRTC cannot begin to address the systemic issue until new legislation is in place.” In the short term, the labour tax credit system currently in place for print news should be expanded to local television news, she argued, pointing to comments made by Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez last week when he said “news is news” while talking about the government’s upcoming news media compensation bill – which will include broadcasters. Watson said the CityTV news stations located in Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver will “enhance” its newscasts, add a total of 23 new reporters, an Indigenous “component,” and two reporters to the parliamentary bureau in order to bring a western Canadian perspective to national reporting, when Waugh claimed that CityTV does not do newscasts out West. “I think with the CRTC this is a major concern – you now have 52 per cent of the Canadian market in media if this sale goes ahead. You've just said you don't have anything in my province of Saskatchewan. This is a concern with the sale of Shaw to Rogers. You're not addressing the local news angle, you've cherry picked your big centres,” Waugh said. Watson argued that they only have 52 per cent of carriage channels and that between the three private broadcasters, GlobalTV, BCE Inc.’s CTV and CityTV, the latter is the smallest. Rogers vice-president of regulatory cable, Pamela Dinsmore, told the committee that the ILNF funding, which provides $21 million per year to the independent broadcasters, is an issue that is bigger than the transaction and should be rolled into the CRTC’s study of the fund which it is set to begin this year. “So this is something that the commission itself will have to figure out and whether they should be restructuring the ILNF to take into account the fact the course will now be eligible to access that funding,” Dinsmore said. She added that Rogers will direct $8.5 million, as a one-time stopgap measure, to the ILNF at the close of the transaction. – Reporting by Jenna Cocullo at jcocullo@thewirereport.ca and editing by Michael Lee-Murphy at mleemurphy@thewirereport.ca.

Rogers “not putting a dime” in middle tier news market: Conservative MP

Broadcast | March 2, 2022

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Rogers “not putting a dime” in middle tier news market: Conservative MP

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