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HOLLAND
COLLEGE • November 1, 2001
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INSIDE |
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Bootlegging: the Maritime way? ----------------- |
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Debate
over newspaper policy sparks national controversy By Lee Webb Staff reporter When Steven Kimber sat down at his computer to write his column for the Halifax Daily News, a column he had been writing for 15 years, he knew it wo  uld
cause some controversy.There were new owners. There were new rules. And what he was about to write wouldn't be received well by those new owners. They were the Aspers, the family who owns the CanWest Global television network and the Southam newspaper chain. Knowing he was going to aggravate his bosses hardly slowed his fingers as he began to type. He began by recounting another column which had met with resistance from his publisher: "My most sweetly satisfying moment as a columnist for the (Halifax) Daily News came on the afternoon of Nov. 20, 1997 when the publisher called to complain about a column I'd written for the next days paper." The column criticized new owner Conrad Black and publisher Mark Richardson for cutting the paper's editorial budget. He explained this came at a time when he felt The Daily News was challenging The Halifax Herald for dominance in the area. As in that case, this time around he wasted no time expressing his feelings about the new owners: "CanWest's (the company that owns Southam) owner, Winnipeg's Asper family ... appear to consider their newspapers not only as profit centres and promotional vehicles for their television network but also as private, personal pulpits from which to express their views." Nonsense, said Murdoch Davis, editor-in-chief of Southam News. The problem was the column wasn't accurate. "Iÿm not going to be held accountable for the lies that other people tell," Davis said in a telephone interview from his corporate office in Winnipeg. The column never ran. Kimber was told the column was spiked because it contained factual errors. He promptly quit. "I think thatÿs a load of bull. I donÿt think there were factual errors in it," said Kimber. He's wrong, said Davis. The essential error was it said the policy would restrict what Kimber and other columnists could say. "Weÿre certainly not going to publish a column that misrepresents our own policy." Davis said the idea behind the policy is to promote debate across the country on national issues. The policy also states local editorials cannot conflict with the national editorials. "The newspapers own editorials are expected to not contradict the national editorials on their core points," Davis said. He added some people misunderstand the policy and think the same rule applies to columnists and freelance writers. "Theyÿre either deliberately not listening or theyÿre deliberately misconstruing the policy for theyÿre own competitive or other reasons." Kimber says his experience suggests that's not true. "I've had more than one recent column sliced and diced. I can only assume it was done to remove opinions that did not correspond with those of the new owners," Kimber wrote in his column. "And I admit I've also done some self-censoring too, steering clear of certain subjects on which I know the owners have taken a stand for me." Peter Desbarats sees another problem with the policy of national editorials. As time goes on, the number of topics covered will increase, meaning the number of topics local editorial writers can cover will decrease, said the former dean of the graduate school of journalism at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario. (Desbarats was also a senior consultant and associate research director during the 1981 Kent Inquiry, a royal commission which looked at the effects of concentration of ownership in newspapers.) "Ultimately (editorial writers) are going to end up having the freedom to write editorials on downtown parking or on very local matters and almost not at all on important national and international questions." The managing editor of the Asper-owned Guardian, Gary MacDougall, doesn't see a problem. He said the policy wonÿt affect the way they write editorials because they deal mostly with local issues. "The majority of our editorials are on local issues. We offer P.E.I. news, P.E.I opinions, P.E.I. concerns." Desbarats said there are three groups of people who have rights in this situation: the publisher, the journalists and the public. The owner of a newspaper has the right to put whatever they want in their paper. The journalists have the right to as much independance and freedom of expression as possible. And the public has the right to know what is happening in the world around them. "They are all clearly defined rights that have to coexist with the other rights." However none of these rights are absolute, he said. Journalists must adjust their rights to the publisher's right to control the newspaper and there are matters like national security and defence which should not be made public. "The Aspers are treating the publisher's right to put what they want in their papers, in effect, as an absolute right," Desbarats said. "In principal, thatÿs wrong." Journalists seek inquiry The debate has also taken on a national flavour. The Canadian Association of Journalists is calling on the government to call a public inquiry into the situation. The issue was discussed at the association's Capital Connections 2002 meeting held April 12-14 in Ottawa. Kimber was there. He said although nothing concrete was decided, the topic was on the minds of most of those there. "It was clear that there is a real concern among journalists about whatÿs been happening, and what it means." Davis said he was invited to the meetings but he felt the association should have discussed the matter with him before it called on the government to step in. "Weÿre not going to dignify the CAJ given the position that itÿs taken." After his experience with the Kent inquiry in 1981, Desbarats said he doesn't think much will be accomplished by another royal commission. "A public inquiry is probably useless as an instrument to do something about concentration of ownership," he said. "None of the recommendations of the royal commission on newspapers were ever enacted." The Kent inquiry proposed a newspaper act to force chains to divest themselves of some of their papers. It would have seen the creation of a press writers panel to monitor the editorial quality of chain-owned newspapers. Desbarats said the newspaper act never happened because publishers strongly opposed the idea in their editorials and the government didn't want to antagonize such an influential group. Today, he added, it could prove difficult to get a Liberal government to launch an inquiry into a newspaper chain owned by a prominent Liberal supporter, the Asper family. Other critics of an inquiry say it would be a mistake to involve government in the running of newspapers. If politicians gain control over the media, there is the possibility they will use that power to cover things up and spin news in their favor, said MacDougall. "If you start putting that kind of power to control the news media in the hands of politicians, who's to say some politician wonÿt come along who might do something controlling in that way." The only solution may be to continue to inform Canadians about what is going on and let them decide for themselves, said Desbarats. "My own hope is that the Aspers would come to their senses at some point and realize that what they are doing is not only ethically and politically bad, but perhaps commercially negative as well." |
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