Apparently, the fifth column of Pierre Poilievre’s platform – “axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget, stop the crime” – is “gut the media.”
The Conservative leader made that abundantly clear last week when he lashed out at a Canadian Press reporter for repeatedly asking him to explain why his party had once supported granting $120 million in regulatory relief to Canada’s struggling mainstream media.
“Our party does not support tax dollars for media outlets because that’s when we end up with biased media like you, who come here and articulate the PMO talking points rather than delivering real news to the Canadian people. Justin Trudeau gave Bell Media and other media tax dollars supposedly to protect media jobs. And then what happened? They all got laid off!”
He continued: “So I guess that wasn’t the real reason for giving tax dollars to the media. The real reason was for him to buy support from the media, which is what he actually did. So we believe that media should be driven by readership, viewership and listenership. That’s what allows it to represent the Canadian people rather than taking marching orders from the PMO.”
It’s true that Trudeau’s Liberal Party has supported Canadian media – including $40 million in regulatory relief for Bell Media in 2022, which nonetheless announced earlier this month that it would lay off 4,800 employees, attempt to sell 45 of its radio stations and cut newscasts from CTV after posting a $40 million operating loss.
But the rest is an absurd lie. If there were a consensus in Canadian media right now – which there isn’t, since we still have a free press in this country – it would be that Trudeau is done, the Liberals are doomed, and Poilievre will almost certainly become Canada’s next prime minister.
Don’t believe me? Watch the CBC. Read the Globe and Mail. Listen to a Postmedia podcast. They’re all covering every mistake the government makes – from accidentally honouring a Nazi to the ArriveCan scandal and failing to prevent the housing crisis.
Canada’s mainstream media has also been reporting on every poll conducted since last summer finding that Canadians are tired of Trudeau – and, overwhelmingly, they’ve been nodding along in agreement. In the same press scrum where Poilievre lost his temper, another reporter asked him what he’ll do when he’s prime minister – not if.
Most Canadians already know this – or at least the ones who are paying attention do. More than half of Canadians who read newspapers trust what they read in the mainstream media – despite the fact that social media has become plagued with people like Poilievre claiming that Canadian journalists are nothing more than Liberal propagandists.
Now, regarding the suggestion that Canada would be better off if Canadian media were solely funded by the audiences they attract: Sure, that would be great. And yes, once upon a time that was possible, back when owning a newspaper was essentially a licence to print money.
But having a strong military was also once a great way to get rich – in that case by plundering resources from rival nations and enslaving their women and children. However, times have changed: In 2024, expecting Canadian journalism to make money is about as realistic as proposing that the Canadian military should be profitable.
That’s not because people no longer consume news: 83% of Canadians read a newspaper at least once a week. Nor is it the case that younger Canadians are less interested: 89% of Millennials and 87% of Gen Z are weekly news readers compared to just 78% of Boomers. It’s simply that people think they should get it for free: Only 11% of Canadians have an online news subscription.
That, plus the fact that newspaper advertising revenue fell by nearly 40% during the pandemic. And that was after more than a decade of steep declines beginning with the 2008 financial crisis and the rise of the internet. And those declines haven’t stopped since then: Bell Media cited a $140 million decline in advertising revenue in 2023 to justify its retreat from Canadian news.
So we have a situation where Canadians – especially younger Canadians – want trustworthy news… they just aren’t willing to pay for it. But just like the military, the media is essential for protecting Canadian democracy. The difference between the two is that soldiers protect us from foreign authoritarians while journalists protect us from the home-grown variety.
And that brings us to the real reason why Poilievre has promised to spend more tax dollars on the military but none on the media. While he lacks Donald Trump’s bald ambition to exploit political power to enrich himself and his fellow oligarchs, the two have one thing in common: They both want to remake their countries into fantasy islands where taxes are low, everything is somehow better and, critically, nobody can challenge them or hold them accountable.
It’s the same reason why Poilievre has vowed to defund the CBC. He claims it’s because the public broadcaster is biased – but the truth is that he has forbidden the Conservatives from appearing on the country’s premier politics program, Power and Politics, despite ongoing invitations from the network to come on the show and present their positions.
If Poilievre wins the next federal election – not when, if – and makes good on his promise to cut support for private and public media, it will be a bloodbath. And the last fifteen years have already been brutal – despite Trudeau’s efforts to protect the very institutions that hold his government to account and are predicting his political demise.
Poilievre possesses no such principals. For perpetual liars like him, the fewer journalists the better. That’s why he’s waging war on Canadian media. And Canadian journalists can’t really fight back – because their job is to report the news, not make it. So Canadian democracy’s last line of defence may be the Canadian electorate. Sooner or later, Canadians will be forced to pick a side.