There’s no reason the current perfect storm of media trouble shouldn’t hit the CBC. That said, the Ceeb’s situation is at once easier and more complex, with governments suddenly eager to pump money in to save businesses, but this particular government historically chilly to the public broadcaster.
And so, a Star story on the CBC’s quest for a federal loan to stem a $65-million advertising shortfall is chilling.
“It’s a perfect storm, the beginning of a death spiral,” the story quotes Ian Morrison, spokesperson for Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, a broadcast industry watchdog group, as saying.
It’ll be interesting to see whether the CBC weathers the downturn any differently than other organizations. Of course, one of the alternative business models we here at Working Title are examining is public funding. We interviewed Tom Watson, from Canadian Business Magazine, whose masters thesis focused on the question of a publicly funded newspaper. Here’s what he told us:
Simply put, Canadians are guaranteed a press press. But daily newspapers live and die by advertising. They have to limit reporting to white space generated by the market. To get advertisers, they must print what sells, which is why today’s papers have colour, larger text and a lot of feel-good or sensational stories designed to attract readers, not educate or edify them.
There is the CBC, which is supposed to do a better job at journalism than other stations thanks to public funding, but it isn’t free to do whatever it wants and newspapers can do a better job at reporting detail that TV spots.
My idea for a free press, which I’d argue is philosophically required to educate masses in a true representative democracy, is to set up a national paper, maybe just during election years, maybe all the time. It would be delivered free to all voters, maybe online. It would just cover news and public policy debate. Staff would be selected by lot from the ranks of the Canadian media with 5-plus years experience. They would serve fixed terms. Funding would be written in stone by a constitutional amendment, not subject to political goodwill or ads (although political party could be offered equal space to sell itself).
Interesting ideas, though we’ll have to wait to see how the CBC’s position at the mercy of a potentially unfriendly government purse works out.
- Stumbling CBC seeks federal help, Toronto Star, Feb. 25
Tags: public funding