Global Domination: What hath convergence wrought?
Kelly Nestruck, CUP Quebec Bureau Chief

Journalism in Canada is in a sorry state. Over the past months, it has increasingly become clear that, under the guise of buzzwords like "convergence" and "horizontal integration," the diversity of opinion in Canada's newspapers has been shrinking. Columnists at certain papers who express differing opinions on their company's policies, the Middle East or the prime minister have been censored. Journalists who disagree with company policy have had their jobs threatened for speaking out. The effect has been particularly strong at the Montreal Gazette. The perpetrator of this assault on free press and diversity of opinion is CanWest Global.

Last month, Southam, the newspaper chain owned by CanWest, announced that it would begin running national editorials in twelve of its major daily newspapers. The editorials would be written by Murdoch Davis, editor in chief of Southam, and eventually run three times a week. Individual papers owned by CanWest would be prohibited from running certain editorials which deviated from the opinions expressed by Davis at Southam's head office.

According to Robert Cribb, president of the Canadian Association of Journalists, the danger is clear. "It poses not only a potential threat to journalism, but to the public interest."

"The federal government has allowed these media monoliths to create themselves, and without much regulation or much attention to what the implications might be. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you allow companies like CanWest... to grow into what they are that there's going to be implications for journalism and the public interest."

CanWest owns 14 major daily newspapers: The Halifax Daily News, St. John's Telegram, Charlottetown Guardian, Montreal Gazette, Ottawa Citizen, Windsor Star, St. Catharines Standard, Regina Leader Post, Saskatoon StarPhoenix, Calgary Herald, Edmonton Journal, Vancouver Sun, Vancouver Province, and Victoria Times-Colonist. In addition, CanWest owns more than 120 daily and weekly newspapers and flyer publications in smaller communities across Canada.

On the television front Global Television Network broadcasts via 11 stations, licenced in eight provinces, and reaching 94 per cent of English-speaking Canada. In addition, CanWest Global owns and operates three independent television stations, seven specialty channels (including Prime and Men TV), and owns two CBC affiliates. There are other large media conglomerates in Canada including Bell Globemedia, which owns the Globe and Mail and CTV, but they don't have the reach or influence of CanWest.

Nowhere did the furor over national editorials hit harder than at the Gazette in Montreal, where over 50 journalists removed their bylines for a couple of days in December in protest of the policy. A letter entitled "Media Giant Silences Local Voices" appeared on the Gazette journalists' website early in December, and copies were printed in non-Southam newspapers like the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, and Montreal's La Presse.

Shortly thereafter, a crackdown ensued on the protesting journalists, initiated by CanWest and implemented by the senior editors at the Gazette. On December 14, CanWest forced the discontinuation of the Gazette employees' website. The letter, which can now be found on a website administered by the Quebec Federation of Professional Journalists(http://www.fpjq.org/canwest/index.html), is still gathering names. As of January 11, 76 Gazette journalists had signed it. Subsequently, a memo was sent out to all Gazette employees by editor-in-chief Peter Stockland and managing editor Raymond Brassard, intended to stifle dissent: "Freedom of expression and freedom of the press are crucial matters for all journalists. However, journalists and other staff working for newspapers such as the Gazette must also remember that they are employees of a company..."

"[A]ll staff must understand no statements or actions to outside media agencies should occur that might reasonably have the effect of... [c]alling into question the good faith of decisions taken by senior management up to and including the proprietors of this newspaper."

The memo ended ominously: "Crucial as free expression and a free press are to journalists, they do not automatically trump every other right. Nor does the designation 'journalist' negate the right of the owner of a newspaper company to run that newspaper as he or she wishes, consistent with the law. No one, journalist or otherwise, has the right to work at the Gazette."

The management soon showed they meant business by suspending award-winning sports columnist Jack Todd for a week without pay after he allegedly sent an email critical of CanWest, not to the public, but out on a company-wide listserv. Since the memo went out, Gazette journalists have, naturally, been keeping a low profile and have referred outside inquiries to their union representative.

Basem Boshra worked as a reporter at the Gazette for three and a half years. Boshra's contract with the paper ran out just over a week ago. Now that he is no longer under the employ of CanWest, he feels comfortable speaking about what happened at the Gazette early in December.

"There was actually quite a bit of solidarity among the employees for the first time in a long time as far as I can remember," Boshra says. "People are upset about these national editorials. There's no doubt about that. We made that displeasure public."

Boshra signed the letter that Gazette reporters sent to the media. He is not sure why only the reporters at the Gazette have made public their discontent with the national editorials, though many have speculated that it may be because theirs is a unionized newsroom. Boshra feels that the stakes may be higher in Quebec, because so-called national editorials don't take into account the complexities of Quebec life. "These national editorials could potentially cause more friction here in Quebec because we are in a pretty unique situation in terms of linguistics and in terms of politics," he says. Indeed, in a recent television interview, the author of the national editorials, Murdoch Davis, seemed unaware that the Quebec Liberal party was a federalist party. Boshra feels that most senior editors sympathize with the reporters' sentiments, but have more to lose if they speak out.

"I think a lot of people in upper management at all of these papers feel exactly the same way we do, but they are in no position to do anything about it without falling on their swords," he says.

Still, some higher-ups at the Gazette, if not falling on their sword, have expressed their displeasure with the Aspers' overarching control and unbridled convergence:

* In August, Michael Goldbloom, a respected figure in the journalism world, left the Gazette as publisher citing issues with CanWest's "centralized approach." Goldbloom's replacement, announced last Thursday, is former Montreal Alouettes president Larry Smith, a man with much business experience but no knowledge of journalism or journalistic ethics.

* Peter Hadekal, the respected editorial page editor of the paper, asked to be reassigned earlier this fall. He requested the reassignment before the national editorials were implemented, but after CanWest's approach to journalism had become clear.

* Mark Harrison, Norman Webster and Senator Joan Fraser, the three editors-in-chief immediately before Peter Stockland, wrote a letter expressing their concern with the national editorial policy which was printed in the Gazette and the Globe and Mail. * Despite the fact that he signed the protest letter and opposed many of CanWest's decisions, Boshra does not feel that played a role it his contract not being renewed, nor is he worried that it will inhibit his ability to be hired at CanWest-owned papers in the future. However, he adds, "I may be being naïve."

"While our local editors overwhelmingly fill their papers with local editorial views and op-ed columns, and will continue to do so, there is a good reason to also publish a national view from time to time," he said. "One that is independent of purely regional interests and looks at what's best for the nation as a whole rather than local or regional communities."

While Asper may give lip service to diversity of opinion, since CanWest's takeover of the Southam newspaper chain November 2000 there has been increased interference by the proprietors in what columnists can and cannot say. There are three topics that are now essentially considered off-limits: criticism of CanWest Global's operations, criticism of Prime Minister Jean Chretien, and criticism of Israel.

Doug Cuthand is the most recent victim of CanWest's censorship. Cuthand's weekly column on aboriginal affairs has been running for ten years in the Saskatoon StarPhoenix and the Regina Leader Post. The week that he decided to write sympathetically toward the Palestinians, however, the papers rejected his column. "I wrote a column saying that what was happening in the Middle East was equivalent to [Aboriginal] land claims and that both the Palestinians and Israelis had to see it from that point of view," says Cuthand, who has won three awards from the North American Journalists Association for his columns.

"They didn't give me a reason," says Cuthand, "but I have a pretty good idea what it was. It's because I was kind of negative to Israel. It probably didn't fit their policy."

Cuthand is the latest in a string of columnists to speak out about CanWest's heavy-handedness. Earlier this month, both Stephen Kimber and Stephanie Domet of the Halifax Daily News quit after their editors refused to let them print articles critical of CanWest. In December, the Gazette's Don MacPherson wrote in a column that, "a policy that forbids a newspaper from deciding for itself where the interests of its readers lie is not only bad journalism, it's also bad business." Before it was published, it was changed to read: "A uniquely Canadian policy that allows for editorials written from both local and national viewpoints, and occasionally lively disagreement between the two, could be good for business."

In November, Gazette TV critic Peggy Curran wrote a column about a CBC documentary which was critical of the Israeli army. The column was held and Curran had to alter it. One of the most famous examples of the Aspers' distaste for differing opinions occurred when they fired syndicated national affairs columnist Lawrence Martin in July, after he repeatedly criticized the prime minister for his alleged role in the Shawinigate affair.

And these are only the examples which have come to light. Cribb at the Canadian Association of Journalists says he has heard "a lot of those kinds of concerns" from reporters or columnists who have not gone public.

Cuthand wasn't a big fan of Southam's former chairman, the bombastic and conservative Conrad Black, but he is beginning to remember Black's era fondly. "Newspapers have a moral obligation to serve their community. They're not just there as profit centers, they have a higher calling than that."

He, like the majority of journalists from all sides of the political spectrum, feels the national editorials are an ill-advised policy. "I think [Southam] should back off and let the journalists do their work. I think each newspaper should reflect the community they work in and not have to print these silly articles written in Winnipeg and sent across the country."

Contrary to what Asper says, those offended by the national editorial policy come from across the political spectrum. In Montreal, the right-wing weekly Suburban condemned CanWest's national editorial policy. Conservative reporters at the Gazette - including some adamant Zionists - were among those who signed the letter. All papers not owned by CanWest have - perhaps, a little gleefully - condemned the move, including La Presse, Le Devoir, the Toronto Star, and the Globe and Mail.

The International Federation of Journalists, the worlds largest group of journalists with half a million members, joined the Canadian Association of Journalists in condemning CanWest. The right-wing Quebec Liberal party introduced a motion supporting the Gazette reporters in the National Assembly and it passed unanimously. And yes, the left-wing federal NDP asked the commons heritage committee to investigate what they consider a threat to press freedom.

Despite the outcry, CanWest has refused to back down on the national editorial policy, and decisions to cut dissenting columns and articles seem to be increasing. Ironically, Southam has used the argument of press freedom to argue against government intervention. National editorial writer Murdoch Davis said last Wednesday that whatever one thinks of a newspaper's editorial policy, "to invite the government to in any way get involved in editorial content is much worse."

Robert Cribb, president of the CAJ, sees some glimmer of hope in that ordinary citizens seem to understand the threat that CanWest's tightening grip poses. "The issue [has] really captured the public's imagination," he says. "People seem to get the fact that the shrinking of diversity of voices is a problem."

It's up to them to apply pressure on the government - and on the newspapers to which they subscribe - to stop the threat.

As long as the media convergence trend continues, don't expect to find any diversity of opinion in your CanWest Global-owned paper. For now, it seems the only opinion that is fit to print is that of Izzy Asper, his progeny, and their lackeys.

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