Blacklock's Reporter

The Department of Public Works quietly awarded millions in untendered contract fees to the nation’s largest newspaper chain twelve days after announcing a media bailout, records show. The sole-sourced contract to Postmedia Network Inc. was the largest of its kind approved for “communications research services”.

Neither Postmedia nor the department commented on the contract worth $5,551,698. It was awarded April 1, only days after cabinet’s March 19 budget proposed a $595 million bailout for federally-approved media in a bill that has yet to pass Parliament.

Postmedia’s flagship daily National Post in news coverage of the bailout wrote: “The federal government’s plan to invest $595 million in local journalism should assist Postmedia in continuing to make its transition from relying on print revenue streams to those in the digital realm.”

Records did not explain why Postmedia was paid for “communications research”, or what justified the $5.55 million fee on a contract to expire in a year. The department on the same day awarded a similar untendered communications research contract to the rival Torstar Corporation’s iPolitics division worth $266,545, one-twentieth the value.

The newspaper chain has reported a total $962.23 million in net losses in the past six years. No Postmedia executive has testified at parliamentary hearings on the bailout detailed in Bill C-97 the Budget Implementation Act.

Then-CEO Paul Godfrey in his last appearance at parliamentary hearings in 2016, at the Commons heritage committee, told MPs dailies would die without taxpayers’ aid. “We’re asking the government to be an ally,” said Godfrey: “We know that a free press isn’t really free.”

“There have been no fiercer critics of subsidies to the media than the Toronto Sun and the National Post; how do you square your editorial position with your corporate position?” asked Liberal MP Adam Vaughan (Spadina-Fort York, Ont.). “You realize that columnists have the right to say what they want,” replied Godfrey.

The Department of Canadian Heritage in earlier 2016 Access To Information memos questioned whether Postmedia could “keep the wolf from the door” amid annual, multi-million dollar losses. Postmedia that year announced it would cut its payroll 20 percent and stop hiring freelancers. “Postmedia’s valiant efforts to keep the wolf from the door do not mean the chain can survive in its current form,” wrote Ramzi Saad, then-deputy director general of cultural industries.

“What is happening to Postmedia papers will now happen to the Globe & Mail and the Toronto Star in five years,” wrote Ben Schnitzer, then-senior policy analyst with Heritage Canada’s periodical publishing policy division.

Collapse of the Postmedia chain would leave 28 cities without a daily newspaper. The heritage department as late as 2017 opposed any attempt to “bail out industry models that are no longer viable”, said then-Minister Mélanie Joly.

By Staff

Premier Ford

may be immortalized

with a monument

built of flexible, six-feet long tube,

bearing a tiny camera

at its tip.

In memory of his willingness

to stop funding sedation

during colonoscopy.

At the base,

high-definition LED monitors

would transmit live streams

from area hospitals

as the invasive probes

push their way

up and away.

Visitors would enjoy a snapshot

into the mind of a leader

who could see a little further.

(Editor’s note: poet Shai Ben-Shalom, an Israeli-born biologist, examines current events in the Blacklock’s tradition each and every Sunday)

Elections Canada investigators have waged a four-month manhunt for sponsors of a fake news item targeting New Democrat leader Jagmeet Singh. Access To Information records indicate the hoax was traced to a company registered in Israel.

“The identity of the purchaser of the electoral advertising is unknown,” wrote Nicholas Alexander, lead investigator for the Commissioner of Elections: “I believe it is necessary to determine the identity of the purchaser.”

Singh was campaigning in a February 25 byelection in Burnaby South, B.C. when the online Vancouver Courier published a February 4 website ad depicting the NDP leader alongside a $5.5 million home. “Jagmeet Singh shows off his new mansion”, read the caption.

Singh does not own a mansion. The falsehood also appeared in ad banners at The History Channel and other websites.

The content was removed February 6 after it was exposed by The Tyee. New Democrats filed a federal complaint citing a breach of the Elections Act section 91 that states: “No person shall with the intention of affecting the results of an election, knowingly make or publish false statements of fact in relation to the personal conduct of a candidate or prospective candidate.”

Investigator Alexander in a report said he sought a judicial order to compel release of  records from an ad broker that would identify the source. “I determined section 91 does not apply to the circumstances, given the image and accompanying caption does not constitute a false statement of fact in relation to the personal character or conduct of Mr. Singh,” wrote Alexander, former staff sergeant with the RCMP commercial crimes unit. “However, other sections of the Act pertaining to election advertising did apply.”

Alexander wrote the fake news item appeared to breach section 319 that requires disclosure of sponsors of campaign ads under federal spending limits. “I believe the advertisement featuring an image of Jagmeet Singh constitutes election advertising, specifically because (it) depicts an image of Jagmeet Singh and states he possesses a mansion; (it) depicts another image of Jagmeet Singh beside two images of a large mansion, with a headline insinuating that he owns a $5.5 million mansion; the NDP policy book at paragraph three states the NDP believes in ‘implementing a national strategy to ensure secure, adequate, accessible and affordable housing for Canadians,’” wrote Alexander.

The report continued: “The advertisement implies that Jagmeet Singh owns a $5.5 million mansion which conflicts with stated policy of the NDP with respect to accessible, affordable housing. The advertisement clearly opposes his candidature as it calls into question his bona fides as leader of the NDP. It implies his lifestyle is not conducive to the stated policy provisions of the NDP with respect to affordable housing.”

First Fake News Probe

The ad was posted through a broker, Taboola Canada Inc. of Toronto, that was cleared of any wrongdoing. Taboola told the Commissioner of Elections it “did not produce any of the content”, but could not identify who did without a court order.

Investigator Alexander obtained the order March 27. Evidence suggested the ad was purchased through a firm listed in the Israeli corporate registry, according to Access To Information records.

The Commissioner of Elections yesterday would not comment on the ongoing probe. “The duration of these investigations can vary greatly,” said Michelle Laliberté, spokesperson for the Commissioner. The Singh mansion hoax is the first to fall under federal investigation since cabinet on January 30 announced a $7 million program to monitor online news coverage in the October 21 general election campaign.

“Ultimately it’s not our job to tell Canadians what is good or bad information, but to provide them the tools and the resources to, when something comes to them, to make a choice on their own and to say where this information is coming from, who is behind it, and what their objective is,” Minister of Democratic Institutions Karina Gould earlier told reporters.

“When you open up a newspaper, you have a sense this is coming from a journalist who’s professional, who has done their research, who has worked at it, and whose information is coming from a reliable source,” said Gould. “Of course, depending on which newspaper that is, you have a sense of where that information is coming from. When you go onto a social media platform and you see a meme or you see a story, if it’s being shared by a friend or a cousin or someone trusted, you may implicitly share that information because it’s coming from a trusted source.”

New Democrats expressed frustration with the pace and scope of the investigation. “It spread through Twitter and Facebook who themselves have no responsibilities,” MP Nathan Cullen (Skeena-Bulkley Valley, B.C.) told a February 7 hearing of the House affairs committee. “What happens then?”

“It’s a completely made up story to try to discredit the NDP leader in the byelection,” said Cullen. “It is utterly untrue.”

“What we have now is fake news which is akin to a match,” said Cullen: “Social media is like the wind. These lies can be weaponized now unlike ever before, and weaponized in that they’re targeting particular voters on their motivated issues. Is that a fair analogy in terms of what the threat is?”

“Certainly that is a significant threat,” replied Chief Electoral Officer Stéphane Perrault.

By Staff