The Trudeau government is pulling its advertising from Facebook and Instagram as negotiations heat up over C-18 the Online News Act..Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez made the announcement at a news conference on Wednesday morning..“Facebook has decided to be unreasonable, irresponsible and started blocking news. This is why today we are announcing the Government of Canada will be suspending advertising on Facebook and Instagram,” said Rodriguez..Rodriguez said that the federal government spends around $10 million on Facebook and Instagram advertising. .“What's important is that we are removing ourselves from posting on Facebook and we will be reinvesting that money,” said Rodriguez..Rodriguez opened the news conference by defending Canadian news media and their essential role in Canada’s democracy..“Canadians seeing their access to quality fact-based independent news disappear and we all know what this means. It means that it's hurting our democracy,” said Rodriguez..Google and Meta are responsible for approximately 80% of all revenue derived from Canadian news media content, which is about $10 billion, according to Rodriguez..“We're talking about two huge platforms that are using content from our journalists, from our news organizations, profiting off their ads and watching journalism decline as they eat up huge revenue,” said Rodriguez..“As a matter of fact, 80% of the revenue is going to those two companies in 2022. That represented almost $10 billion.”.Rodriguez is “convinced” that a deal can be reached with Google..“We believe we have a path forward and we're willing to continue talking with the platforms without going into details because we don't negotiate in public,” said Rodriguez..“But we are convinced that Google's concerns will be resolved through regulations. In the meantime, and this is very clear, the platforms do not have any obligations under the Act, none.”.The Trudeau government wants Meta to return to the negotiation table..“So today, we're calling on both platforms to stay at the table, work through the regulatory process with us, contribute their fair share, and keep news on their platform,” said Rodriguez..“It's good for the platforms, good for Canada, good for Canadians, good for our democracy. The platforms know that we're at the table. We're ready to talk to them. We're open to discuss."."What we're not open to doing is nothing. Status quo is not an option.”.NDP House leader Peter Julian contributed to the news conference and discussed the state of Canadian news media..“I've seen firsthand in New Westminster-Burnaby, the impact of what has been a vacuum of huge resources towards the web giants and certainly we've seen among the 450 journalism outlets that have closed across the country, two of them have been in my riding,” said Julian. .“Therein lies the importance of C-18. And that is why today we have parliamentarians representing two-thirds of the House of Commons saying very clearly that the web giants need to respect Canadian law.”.“They have profited enormously from Canada. Now it's time to give back some of those funds to help support local journalism across the country and help to revive our journalistic sector,” said Julian.
