Hey Minister Rodriguez: Canadian Digital Creators Are Not Loopholes

Canadian digital creators are not loopholes and characterizing efforts to address their concerns as such is a stain on the Heritage Minister

Mar 9, 2023

Tax Day New York. April 17, 2012 by Michael Fleshman https://flic.kr/p/bAS7SC (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The battle over Bill C-11 is nearing its conclusion as the government introduced a motion in the House of Commons yesterday that rejects the Senate’s amendment that would ensure that platforms such as Youtube would be caught by the legislation consistent with the government’s stated objective, but that user content would not. As I discussed yesterday, the decision leaves no doubt about the government’s true intent with Bill C-11: retain the power and flexibility to regulate user content. In fact, I noted that Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez wasn’t trying to disguise that objective since the justification for rejecting the change boiled down to the government wanting the power to direct the CRTC on user content today and the power to exert further regulation tomorrow.

Yet moments before the House of Commons would begin debate on the government’s motion, Rodriguez changed course with a series of tweets that included a new justification premised on rejecting “amendments that create loopholes.”

Pablo Rodriguez @pablorodriguez

As promised, we are accepting amendments that ensure tech giants pay their fair share toward our culture, and we are declining the amendments that create loopholes. That’s what Canadian artists and creators have asked us to do. (2/4)

Rodriguez’s statement suggests that somehow removing digital creators from the ambit of the legislation creates a loophole. From a substantive perspective, this is disinformation. The narrowly crafted amendment by two Trudeau-appointed Senators is specifically designed to meet Rodriguez’s stated objectives. The Internet platforms will still be brought into the Broadcasting Act as the use case Rodriguez often cites – a Weeknd song on Spotify and Youtube should be treated the same by the Act – would be met. The only change is to ensure that user content would be excluded, which Rodriguez insists is the policy objective. This is not a legal loophole.

But more importantly, Canadian digital creators are not loopholes and characterizing efforts to address their concerns as such is a stain on the Heritage Minister. They may not belong to well established lobby groups, make political donations, or hold lavish conferences that provide politicians with big platforms, but their careers and livelihoods are not for this government or this minister to put at risk. For months, they have made their case before MPs and Senators. Many of these creators, participating in a political process for the first time, engaged in the hope that the Minister of Canadian Heritage and the government would demonstrate some concern for their concerns. The Senate took the time to hear them and agreed that this was not about siding with tech companies, but about siding with Canadian creators. For Rodriguez, government MPs, and representatives from the NDP and Bloc to ignore them and reject the Senate fix that would have little negative consequence for anyone else is shameful. And for other creator groups such as the DOC, CMPA, and SOCAN to throw their fellow creators under the bus is unconscionable.

As Rodriguez and Liberal MPs continue to debate the motion on the Senate amendments today, they should know that Oorbee Roy is not a loophole.