Summer 2008 - Canadian Association of Journalists

Transcription

Plus: Tips on learning how to write tighter copy, searching the Internet
and reading financial statements.
Why do journalists
do such a poor job reporting ...
... about themselves?
THE CANADIAN ASSOCIATION OF JOURNALISTS SPRING/SUMMER 2008 • VOLUME 13, NUMBER 4 • $3.95 L’ASSOCIATION CANADIENNE DES JOURNALISTES–
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SPRING/SUMMER 2008
Volume 13, Number 4
Publisher
Nick Russell
I N S I D E
Editor
DEPARTMENTS
David McKie
4
First Word
The state of media criticism in Canada is anemic.
By David McKie
5
JournalismNet
Finding court decisions online is getting easier.
By Julian Sher
6
Inside the numbers
The New York Times’ financial troubles are spelled out in its audited
financial statement.
By Kelly Toughill
8
10
12
14
FEATURES
The same as it always was
The fallout from NAFTAgate
Being accountable
Whither investigative journalism
18
Lost in translation
20
DEPARTMENTS
Writer’s toolbox
Recent controversial events on Parliament Hill involving reporters and politicians and
their surrogates are a reflection of a symbiosis that continues to define relationships in
the nation’s capital.
By Chris Cobb
When the CTV hauled its former Parliamentary correspondent on the carpet for
leaking the details of a conversation, there was a deafening silence among reporters
and media outlets.
By Simon Doyle
Journalists who used leaked reports to write stories that caused Maher Arar no
end of misery should finally come clean and admit they were wrong.
By Andrew Mitrovica
A conversation between two journalists some 30 years ago, led to the creation
of the Canadian Association of Journalists’ predecessor.
By Cecil Rosner
There has to be a better way to bridge the gap between the ethnic and mainstream
media at a time when more and more readers, viewers and listeners are non-white.
By Catherine Murray
Tight writing should not be seen as an attempt to squeeze the life out of a story,
but as a way to remove words, phrases, sentences and complete paragraphs that
are not doing their job.
By Don Gibb
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Peter Jacobsen
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Thomson Blackburn LLP)
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Editorial Board
Chris Cobb,
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Michelle MacAfee,
Lindsay Crysler,
John Gushue,
Rob Cribb,
Rob Washburn
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Administrative Director
John Dickins
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Media is a publication of
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23
For the Record
Journalists writing about Afghanistan should take a closer look at the “experts”
making the case that Canada is fighting the good fight.
By Amir Attaran
24
Legal opinion part one
The Ontario Court of Appeal was right: Press freedom is not absolute.
By John Miller
Subscriptions: $14.98
(GST incl.) per year,
payable in advance
25
Legal opinion part two
Be wary of offering sources blanket protection. By Dean Jobb
26
Fine Print
Responsible journalism. It’s a defence that could help warm libel chill.
By Dean Jobb
27
Computer-assisted reporting
A federal court ruling may embolden government departments to withhold even
more data that is in the public interest.
By Fred Vallance-Jones
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29
Ethics
Media criticism will fail to be effective so long as we think of it as complaining
about bad coverage after the fact, in a piecemeal, story-by-story approach.
By Stephen J. A. Ward
30
The Last Word
The federal Tories had trouble selling their message about our mission in
Afghanistan so the government invoked the help of ex-generals and academics who
pass themselves off as experts.
By Scott Taylor
Cover Photo
AP/Moraes
First Word
By DaviD McKie
The art of introspection
Why do media outlets seem so uncomfortable
with writing about themselves?
T
he theme of this edition of Media magazine
is the unwillingness of media outlets in
general and journalists in particular to
examine themselves critically. We place many
institutions under a microscope, analyzing
flaws, suggesting reforms. But we tend to avoid
submitting our own work, tendencies and flaws
under the same lens. To be sure, upper echelons
of media outlets spend money devising ways
to increase their audiences: smaller newshole,
shorter and snappier newscasts, more stories
about people, fewer stories about government
policies, and so on. Attempts to attract younger
audiences while not alienating older and more
faithful readers, listeners and viewers constitute
a tricky and risky balancing act.
Similar energy, it seems, does not go into
examining the behavior of journalists, our
accountability or lack of it, and our abilities
to tell people stories they care about. There is
little introspection. The lens is foggy and no
one seems to care. Too harsh an assessment?
Perhaps. I’m prepared to be challenged, as I was
recently by my own board of directors. But media
criticism, I argued in my note to them asking for
feedback and suggestions about this edition, in
this country is lacking. And if my attempts to
put together a coherent feature package for this
edition is any indication, speaking frankly about
some of the challenges and problems that beset
journalists can be viewed as a career-ending
proposition.
Recent events at the CBC, CTV and other
media outlets raised issues that should have
received wider attention and broad-based
discussion. Just what is the relationship between
journalists on Parliament Hill and their sources?
Is the relationship too cozy, and are politicians
being hypocritical in expressing outrage about
the conduct of certain reporters whose dilemmas
received more ink in the satirical magazine Frank,
and the niche publication The Hill Times, and not
The Globe and Mail, The CBC, CTV, The Ottawa
Citizen and other CanWest newspapers. What’s
going on? Why are we so afraid to use the same
critical faculties to examine ourselves that we
reserve for politicians and institutions?
When I threw out these questions to members
of Media magazine’s editorial board, some
agreed, others took me to task, suggesting that I
was ignoring the critical role played by schools of
MEDIA, SPRNG/SUMMER 2008 PAGE 4
journalism. Fair enough. Many of this magazine’s
columnists and contributors are from schools of
journalism. They’re able to use their perspective
and critical faculties to examine the issues of the
day. And, of course, I was also reminded that
Media magazine also attempts to fill the void.
Recent events
at the CBC,
CTV and other
media outlets raised
issues that should
have received wider
attention and
broad-based
discussion. Just
what is the
relationship between
journalists on
Parliament Hill and
their sources?
Still, I argued that to my knowledge, there are
few if any journalists covering media as a beat,
breaking stories, holding news outlets to account,
challenging readership and viewer numbers.
It is for this reason that we have devoted a lot of
space in this edition to the examination of media
criticism. In the wake of the incident involving
former Parliamentary CBC correspondent Krista
Erickson and her feeding of questions to a Liberal
MP, Chris Cobb questions the nature of such
relationships and whether the outrage expressed
by politicians and fellow journalists is as genuine
as it appears to be.
Simon Doyle of The Hill Times writes about
the affair involving former CTV Parliamantary
correspondent David Akin, whose outing of
a “source” in my journalism class at Carleton
University led to his eventual departure and a new
job as CanWest’s national correspondent. Andrew
Mitrovica is still puzzled by the way in which
some reporters covered the Maher Arar story with
their apparent willingness to run with leaks that
damaged the torture victim’s reputation at a time
when he was fighting to clear his name, which, of
course, eventually happened. In his ethics column,
Stephen J.A. Ward argues that media criticism
should be more than examining the behavior of
individual journalists. Rather, the lens should
also focus on broader issues that seek to improve
coverage and engage citizens.
And we give the final word to Scott Taylor
who finds it worrying that journalists covering
the Afghanistan story don’t seem to ask hard
questions of the spokespeople who portray
themselves as “experts,” but yet are being paid by
the federal government. It was also with the theme
of media criticism in mind, that we invited Simon
Fraser’s Catherine Murray to write about her
study that looked at the gulf between the ethnic
and mainstream media outlets. Though her study
is specifically related to B.C., her conclusion
about the yawning divide that exists between the
two solitudes can be applied to other cities with
large ethnic media outlets such as Montreal and
Toronto. The divide suggests that mainstream
outlets are doing a poor job at connecting with a
segment of society that Statistics Canada tells us
is growing rapidly.
As usual, we have our array of columnists and
a debate about the significance of a recent court
decision that challenges our ability to protect
sources.
We would love to hear from you about anything
in this or previous editions. Feel free to contact me
at david_mckie@cbc.ca. Remember, this is your
publication. Happy reading. l
Journalismnet
By Julian Sher
It’s easier to find legal information online
You can find everything from federal court decisions to
local conflicts settled in small-claims courts
C
ourts are a treasure trove of information
for journalists — not just for reporters
covering a trial or for someone investigating
a known criminal. People who are in your story
may have been sued, got divorced, testified as an
expert witness or received a reprimand from their
professional body.
Court records also have the advantage of being,
well, court records — they are official documents
from the justice system and you have a lot of
latitude in quoting from them, even if you cannot
always prove everything in them is true.
If your newsroom subscribes to QuickLaw or
one of the other databases (or you have a lawyer
friend who will do a quick search for you) you’re
in luck.
But more and more court records in Canada
are now also online and searchable for free though
the quantity and quality is uneven. A few words
of caution right up front: there is an important
distinction between criminal records and judicial
decisions. The juicy criminal stuff —convictions,
charges, search warrants — are largely not
available online, except in Quebec.
On the other hand, most judicial decisions and
rulings are. So if the target of your investigation
committed murder and never appealed, his guilty
verdict may not be online. Same thing if he and his
wife divorced amicably. But if someone appeals
a conviction or takes a divorce to a higher court,
the juicy details are often online. You just have
to be lucky.
Also, many courts only have decisions posted
for the last few years or perhaps back to the 1990s.
Few have longer historical records online.
If you have a lawyer friend who can do search
for you on QuickLaw — www.lexisnexis.ca/
newquicklaw— that’s the best way to get access
to judicial databases.
For those who don’t have legal buddies, below
are some tips.
PROVINCE BY PROVINCE
Each province lists its own court databases.
You’ll find a list with easy access to each province on
JournalismNet’s legal pages at www.journalismnet.
com/people/canadacrime.htm.
Almost all provinces have their major courts
(Court of Appeal, Superior Court) online — big
cases, important decisions. Some of the more
interesting details on people can be found in lower
courts (provincial or municipal Courts).
Several provinces have their family courts
online — everything from divorce records to child
abuse. In most (but not all) divorce cases, the full
names are not there, but if you know enough details
— place, date, the identity of the lawyers — it is
not hard to get.
All child protection decisions shield the name
of the minor — but again, if a social worker or
aggrieved parent or one of the lawyers gives you
enough of a lead, you should be able to track the
decision.
Small claims courts are a treasure trove to get
the scoop on a dubious local car repair shop or
to see how many times your local McDonald’s
restaurants have been sued.
Finally, some of the best story nuggets can
come from the courts you don’t often think of
right away — such as professional bodies, human
rights tribunals system. For example, decisions
against doctors or police who violated accepted
standards are often online; same with landlords
who discriminate.
Labour tribunals can give you extensive details
of a company or union you are investigating.
CANLII BEST PLACE FOR MAJOR
SEARCHES
Almost all the provinces, list their courts on the
same web page, but you have to visit each court
web site separately to do a search. In other words,
you can’t search the Ontario Court of Appeal and
the Provincial Court at the same time.
This is a problem, particularly if you are not
sure where a court decision was made.
The solution is CANLII — the Canadian Legal
Information Institute, shown below:
From its main website at www.canlii.org you
can search all of the provincial and federal courts:
Or, by clicking on a province’s name, you can
conduct a province-wide search. Or simply select
the court you are interested in.
You can find out the details of what CANLII
stores — in particular the dates for how far back
the court records go — at http://canlii.org/en/
databases.html.
Be creative. Not just with CANLII but with your
other court searches.
For example, don’t just search for names. You
can find story ideas. Put in search terms like “date
rape” or “pit bull” and “bite” to find story ideas
of leads.
If you’re really bored one evening, put in
“Porsche” and “divorce” to read about how some
rich people have too much to fight about.
International searches
American criminal and judicial records are
much more plentiful. You often have to pay, but
you can get criminal records for most jurisdictions.
See www.journalismnet.com/people/uscrime.htm
for a list of pay-for and free services.
Cornell University offers a free search of federal
court decisions.
PACER (Public Access to Court Electronic
Records) at http://pacer.psc.uscourts.gov is the
U.S. federal government’s centralized site for
electronic access to U.S. District, Bankruptcy, and
Appellate court records.
The beauty of PACER is that you can get the
actual documents — indictments, pleas, sometimes
some transcripts. You have to register and there
is a charge per page (8 cents) — although no fee
is apparently owed until a user accrues more than
$10 worth of charges in a calendar year.
The Public Library of Law at http://www.plol.
org offers free search of the U.S. Supreme Court
and cases from all 50 states back to 1997.
For British and Irish legal decisions, the UK
equivalent of Canlii is called Bailii (British and
Irish Public Legal Information) at www.bailii.org.
As always, this article and other columns
are available online with links to all the sites
mentioned on the JournalismNet Tips page at
www.journalismnet.com/tips.
Julian Sher, the creator and webmaster
of Journalism Net (www.journalismnet.com),
does Internet training in newsrooms around
the world. He can be reached by email at
jsher@journalismnet.com. l
Inside the Numbers
By Kelly Toughill
Trouble at The New York Times
Much of the story is told in the company’s financial statement
T
he recent showdown at The New York
Times was a big story. For the second
time in as many years, private investors
demanded that the Sulzberger family share
stewardship of the influential media empire.
The battle played out in press releases and proxy
statements, blogs and television news. The outcome
would affect journalists across the continent, but
the battle wasn’t about journalism, it was about
money.
Financial statements are one of the few
documents that most can’t read intuitively.
Business reporters are trained to decipher them;
the rest of us muddle through. Here’s a quick and
dirty primer on how to read financial statements,
using the New York Times as a case study. (For a
reference, please refer to the table.)
The most important numbers are the audited
financial statements. They have three parts: the
income statement (sometimes called a statement
of operations); the balance sheet and the statement
of cash flows. Those are followed by notes that
explain key details and assumptions.
Read the financials by looking for changes
from one year to the next, and by calculating key
ratios. Numbers that appear inside brackets are
negative, and any number beneath a solid black
line is a sum.
Income Statement
The income statement is a record of revenues
and expenses over the year, including non-cash
expenses such as amortization. The most important
lines in any income statement are total revenues
and net income.
The New York Times 2007 income statement
shows total revenues of $3.2 billion, a shade
lower than 2006 and 2005. Most worrisome is
advertising revenue, which provides two-thirds
of the company’s total income. It is down 5 per
cent from the year before. The notes show that ad
revenue dropped almost 12 per cent in one division
of the company.
The next section of the income statement is
expenses. If revenues fall, expenses must also
fall or the company will lose money. The income
statement shows that the New York Times
Company chopped roughly $100 million from its
books by chopping jobs and reducing newsprint.
Depreciation, amortization and impairment
of intangible assets can dramatically change
profit, even if they don’t affect cash flow. The
2006 income statement of the New York Times
shows an expense of $814 million for impairment
of intangible assets. The company didn’t actually
spend $814 on anything. It decided that things
like the value of its brand, its customer lists and
the expertise of its staff were worth dramatically
less because of the overall drop in value of the
newspaper industry. So, it wrote down the value
2005 and 9.1 cents in 2004.
The income statement shows that revenues, net
income and profit margins are all headed in the
wrong direction for the New York Times.
as an expense. That wiped out its 2006 profit,
even though the expense was nothing more than a
bookkeeping entry.
Net income (profit) is usually found two thirds
of the way down an income statement. The New
York Times had a net income of $208.7 million
in 2007, up dramatically from the $543 million
it lost the year before. (Remember, the 2006 net
income was negative only because the company
wrote down the value of its intangible assets.) More
important, the 2007 net income is below the $253
million it earned in 2005.
The key calculation for any income statement is
profit margin, or how many pennies of profit are
retained from every dollar of revenue. To calculate
profit margin, divide net income by total revenues.
The New York Times kept 6.5 cents from every
dollar it collected in 2007, down from 8.7 cents in
The balance sheet is a snapshot of a company’s
wealth on the last day of its fiscal year. It shows
what a company owns (assets) and what it owes
(liabilities) and the value of the company held by
stockholders (equity).
Current assets are things that can be turned
into cash within three months, such as stocks,
and money owed to the company by customers
(accounts receivable). Long term assets include
land, buildings, and equipment, minus depreciation
charges, as well as intangibles assets.
Short term liabilities are debts that must be
paid soon, such as money owed to creditors. Longterm liabilities are obligations such as leases, longterm loans and pension obligations.
The crucial calculation on the balance sheet is
Balance Sheet
Continued on Page 9
Feature
By chriS coBB
The same as it always was
The symbiotic relationship between journalists on the
Hill and politicians just won’t go away
T
he late, gregarious New Brunswick premier
Richard (Disco Dick) Hatfield, a tireless
party animal who liked nothing better than
jetting to New York City for the weekend, once
walked into a Manhattan gay bar followed shortly
afterwards by a Canadian reporter looking for the
goods on the premier’s swinging private life.
As told (second hand) by the late Ottawa
Southam News columnist and bureau chief Charles
Lynch, Hatfield sat with a young man while across
the room, the reporter waited for something to
happen. Hatfield drank and chatted the night away
with his young companion, easily outpacing the
tired reporter who eventually got up to leave. ‘’It’s
OK,’’ the premier shouted after him, ‘’your secret’s
safe with me.’’
Hatfield genuinely enjoyed partying with
Ottawa political reporters and many knew that
the premier had a private life that New Brunswick
voters would have frowned upon— to say the least.
But the voters never found out. His secret was safe
with them.
And who can remember the member of
Parliament falling over drunk during the 1964
debate over the Canadian flag? He voted along
party lines and slumped over. It wasn’t reported
because he voted as expected. His drunkenness
was nobody’s business.
So what does any of this have to do with CBC
reporter Krista Erickson publicly banished to
Toronto by management who disapproved of
her providing questions to a Liberal MP who
presumably couldn’t think of any of his own ahead
of Brian Mulroney’s appearance at the Commons
ethics committee? No small irony there.
“Following an investigation by senior
management of CBC News, we have determined
that our reporter Krista Erickson did, in fact,
provide questions to a member of Parliament in
the lead-up to the ethics committee meeting in
December,” acknowledged CBC publisher John
Cruickshank in an open letter to the Conservative
Party.
It was an unprecedented admission of guilt,
obviously deemed necessary to appease the people
who control the CBC’s purse strings and who have
no love for the public broadcaster. But it would
have had Conservative political veterans highfiving down the corridors of power.
Ottawa’s journo-political axis is no stranger
to hypocrisy and phony outrage. So it wasn’t
especially surprising when Erickson kicked up
great quantities of both in January.
After much speculation about when the CBC would address the issue, the corporation’s publisher, John
Cruickshank, offered up this explanation in an open letter to the Conservative Party: “Following an
investigation by senior management of CBC News, we have determined that our reporter Krista Erickson did, in
fact, provide questions to a member of Parliament in the lead-up to the ethics committee meeting in December.”
Coming from the Conservatives, who are
a mixed bag led by former Reform Party and
Canadian Alliance members with a few Mike Harris
Ontario Tories in, the outrage was especially rich.
During the Chrétien years, when Liberals
dominated, opposition MPs courted the Press
Gallery shamelessly to get the occasional mention
in the news media. It’s what Opposition parties
have to do, but they had to work especially hard
at it during the height of the Chrétien years when
the Liberals were so dominant that the National
Post publicly fashioned itself into the official
Opposition.
For their part, Gallery members fed stories, or
portions of stories to Reform/Alliance MPs to spice
up the final goods with some opposition voices.
A story without contrary opinion is not much of
a story.
How many Hill reporters have phoned
opposition critics and offered: “I have a story
running tomorrow about (fill in the blank). I was
wondering whether you’d like to comment.”
After a brief explanation of the story from the
reporter, the opposition critic would issue forth
with an outraged pro-forma criticism and the
story was good to go: “The Opposition blasted the
Chrétien government’s proposed new policy on (fill
in the blank) yesterday, calling it an outrageous
waste of taxpayers money.” Or whatever.
Several federal elections ago, early in the
Chrétien reign, I got a call from a newly appointed
opposition critic who wanted to meet for an
informal lunch to chat about matters related to
his portfolio.
I knew something about the issues he had
been made responsible for but as we chatted, it
became clear that he didn’t have a clue. He wanted
to know what I thought were the most pertinent
issues in the portfolio. I expressed opinions as he
made notes.
But think of this headline: “Outraged Liberals
accuse biased Hill reporter of colluding with the
Opposition.” In my case, it would have been an
almost impossible charge to defend even though I
have no political bias and was interested in nothing
more than cultivating a future source who might
one day find himself in cabinet. He didn’t.
Retired Press Gallery members who managed to
emerge from their careers without leaving too many
brain cells in the Press Club bar will remember
40 years or more ago when the relationships
between Hill politicians and Gallery members were
How many Hill
reporters have phoned
opposition critics
and offered: “I have
a story running
tomorrow about
(fill in the blank).
I was wondering
whether you’d like to
comment.”
incestuous to a degree that would be unthinkable
today. The media and political class drank together,
philandered together and some Hill reporters even
acted as unofficial communications advisors to
their political friends.
The issue of Stephen Harper’s former chief of
staff Ian Brodie and CTV reporters, dealt with on
page 10 of this edition by Simon Doyle, is a more
subtle, modern example of the Hill’s journalistpolitical operative relationship. The Prime
Minister’s Office controls all messages coming out
of government and appears to believe that CTV
gives those messages a more favourable airing than
other media outlets.
The Brodie-CTV case is more complicated than
the Erickson episode but oddly, Brodie had been
painted as some kind of victim – a highly-placed
source who was exposed by reporters he trusted as
opposed to a political operative doing a bit of media
manipulation. When uncommonly tight-lipped
people in high places start chatting to reporters
they are being deliberate and have a motive.
The truth is that Hill reporters have always been
susceptible to overly chummy relationships with
the people they cover and many have been unable
to resist getting sucked too deeply into the power
game. It isn’t an excuse, but history shows it is a
reality.
Chris Cobb is an author, senior reporter with the
Ottawa Citizen and member of Media’s editorial
board. l
Continued from Pg.6
Trouble at The New York Times
the current ratio, which measures the capacity
of a company to pay its immediate bills if it runs
into trouble. In general, analysts like to see a 2:1
ratio, or twice as many current assets as current
liabilities. In 2007, the New York Times Company
had $664.4 million in current assets and $975.7
million in current liabilities, or a current ratio of
68 cents in current assets for every $1 in liabilities.
Not only is that a terrible current ratio, previous
statements show it has been getting worse for
years.
Cash Flow Statement:
This is the strongest narrative of the financial
statements; it tells you exactly where cash came
from and where it was spent by removing noncash distortions such as amortization. Companies
will often try to manipulate the income statement
and balance sheet by doing things like stockpiling
inventory to beef up current assets, or hiking
revenues by including uncertain sales. It is more
difficult to manipulate the cash flow statement.
The cash flow statement has three sections:
operating activities, investment activities
and financing activities. Operating refers to
core operations of the business, such as publishing
newspapers and websites in the case of the New
York Times. The investment section shows how
much was spent on capital items used to support
the core business, such as land, buildings, new
equipment or patents, or whether parts of the
company were sold. The financing section shows
how much cash the company borrowed and how
much debt it paid off.
If a company has a negative operating cash
flow and a big financing cash flow, that shows
it survived the year on borrowed funds. If the
cash flow statement shows very little spent on
investing activities for several years, it may mean
the company isn’t planning for growth.
Cash generated by operating activities is often
the truest measure of general trends.
The New York Times generated $111 million in
2007 through its core operations, according to the
cash flow statement. The year before, it generated
almost four times that much from operations:
$422 million. The year before that, it generated
$299 million. By any measure, cash flows from
operations are going down.
So, the financial narrative for the New York
Times in 2007 was grim. Revenues and net income
were down, profit ratios were down and the current
ratio was dangerously low by most standards.
Add in that cash flow from operations dropped
dramatically, and it is no wonder shareholders are
worried.
Kelly Toughill is an assistant professor of
journalism at the University of King’s College
in Halifax, and a former writer and editor at
Toronto Star. l
Feature
By SiMon Doyle
On the outs with CTV
A former Parliamentary correspondent for the network found himself in
deep trouble after being too frank with journalism students
M
arch 6 was a big day for the national
media. CTVglobemedia’s flagship
national newspaper, The Globe and
Mail, ran a front-page news story about goings-on
in its flagship national television network, CTV.
And it wasn’t a good-news story. It was about a
leak— a curious conversation between Ian Brodie,
the Prime Minister’s then-chief of staff, and a few
reporters from CTV’s Ottawa bureau.
As they so rarely do, the news media had
Speaking at Carleton University’s master of
journalism program on March 3, CTV Hill reporter
David Akin recounted how Brodie approached
himself and CTV Ottawa bureau chief Robert Fife
at the budget lockup in Ottawa on Feb. 26. Brodie
began making small talk, as he often does. Only
this time he mentioned that Hillary Clinton had
told Canadian officials that her rhetoric about
re-negotiating NAFTA was not a serious policy
position. To CTV, this must have seemed like a
Speaking at Carleton University’s master of journalism program on March 3, former CTV Parliamentary
correspondent David Akin recounted how Ian Brodie approached himself and CTV Ottawa bureau chief Robert
Fife at the budget lockup in Ottawa.
reported on themselves, and duly. The story
behind the so-called “NAFTAgate” leak is loaded
with the kind of intrigue reporters don’t much
talk about publicly, such as the sometimes cozy
yet often insulated relationships between reporters
and politicians, government leaks, and reporters
reporting on reporters.
The Globe story followed similar reports by
the Canadian Press and CBC. The media outlets
were tipped off about Brodie’s conversation with
CTV accidentally and in an unusual way: through
a journalism class.
pretty good story. It was passed on to White House
correspondent Tom Clark, who broke it (but with a
focus on Barak Obama) the following day.
This became what we now know as the
“NAFTAgate” story. In fact, the day the Globe
splashed the Brodie conversation on its front page,
there was a rumour around Parliament Hill that
Akin had been reassigned. I recall sitting in the
press gallery of the House of Commons that day,
getting ready to watch Question Period, as CTV’s
Mike Duffy walked in. He looked down the row of
seats to his CTV colleague, Graham Richardson,
and raised his eyebrows as if to say, “What a
day.”
Akin’s remark before the journalism class must
have perked some ears, not least of all one of the
class’s instructors, Canadian Press investigative
reporter Jim Bronskill (the other instructor, CBC
investigative reporter David McKie, was away).
Both CP and the CBC began working on the story
about Brodie, each of which heard about Akin’s
remarks independently. Confirming the story
with CTV sources, the CBC later reported that, “A
CTV reporter told CBC news on Wednesday that
Brodie was, in fact, the source behind the network’s
report.” (ABC had reported earlier, on Feb. 29, that
the leaker was Brodie, citing a source close to the
PMO.)
CTV had become part of the NAFTAgate story,
and with that in mind, our newsroom watched
Mike Duffy Live attentively that afternoon. There
was something of an expectation that CTV might
touch on the leak. The issue was ignored, however,
and perhaps we shouldn’t have been surprised.
There’s always a need for newsroom
transparency in such situations, but reporting
on your colleagues in Ottawa isn’t an easy job.
Parliament Hill media don’t tend to report on
one another, especially in a negative way, partly
because there’s a bit of a camaraderie between Hill
journalists. They’re a reasonably small group who
see one another almost every day, comparing notes,
sharing insights, analysis and information.
Reporting on journalistic standards and
integrity—or a lack thereof— makes it a little
more difficult to chum it up the following day.
Imagine one reporter calling up another and
asking who was his source? That’s very delicate. And
I’ve done it. The Hill Times, by exception, covers
the national media. It was the only newspaper,
by small example, to report that CTV planned
to reassign Akin just before he left CTV to join
Canwest News Service in March (a reassignment
apparently related to his talk at Carleton). After a
couple of years on the Hill, reporters still tend to get
their guards up a little when I come walking.
We cover the national media partly because it’s
in our readers’ interest, but there is also a public
interest. A well-connected lobbyist told me recently
that the most powerful people in this town are the
members of the National Press Gallery, and if that’s
true, the powerful have an obligation to be held
accountable. That’s certainly a power held to some
degree by the relatively new world of blogging.
Reporters kept on their toes are better reporters.
The NAFTAgate affair, as it was sensationally
dubbed by the American media, was a big story
because it involved allegations of Canadian
interference in the U.S. democratic process. An
equally big story, you could argue, was the role of the
media. In his NAFTAgate report on Feb. 27, CTV’s
White House correspondent, Tom Clark, cited
“Canadian sources” as saying that the campaigns of
Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton
and Barack Obama had told Canadian officials not
to take too seriously the rhetoric surrounding the
renegotiation of NAFTA.
The CTV report sparked an outcry within the
American media, which called into question the
credibility of the candidates. Obama and Clinton
fiercely denied the allegations, and the Canadian
embassy in Washington issued a statement saying
that no candidate had contacted the embassy to
discuss NAFTA.
That was followed by another leak on March
2. This time it was to the Associated Press, which
received an internal memo originating from
the Canadian consulate in Chicago, and which
corroborated the Obama portion of Clark’s story
(to a degree).
On March 4, Obama lost the Ohio primary to
Clinton by a wider-than- expected margin, and
in a state where a top issue was job losses and the
impact of Canada-U.S. trade.
It seemed to some that Obama’s loss was at the
hands of political interference from the Canadian
government. Observers noted the suspicious nature
of the double-barreled leak. The second seemed
designed to corroborate the first.
It’s not clear why the story was leaked to CTV.
In fact some speculate that the motivation was
to simply downplay Canadian concerns about
renegotiating NAFTA. Still, leaks can be very
damaging. There are many serious leaks that have
never been reported on extensively.
Few have faith that the RCMP will ever get to
the bottom of the defamatory leaks against Maher
Arar, the innocent Syrian-Canadian who was the
victim of torture and extraordinary rendition.
(Please read Andrew Mitrovica’s story on page 12)
Earlier this year, there was the leak of a confidential,
ministerial letter to Linda Keen, former head of
the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, which
effectively said her job was on the line. The leak
sparked a political firebomb that arguably led to
her removal.
Through leaks, the news media can be used
to serve rather brutish political purposes, and
very effectively. All the more reason to report on
them. Governments have always played favourites
with certain journalists and bureaus in Ottawa
(with the latest example being the Conservative
Party’s awkward attempt to brief a select group of
journalists, the CTV included, on the contents of
a search warrant that allowed the RCMP to search
party headquarters for e-mail correspondence
and other documentation related to spending
on advertising during the last federal election),
and it’s no secret around Parliament Hill that the
Conservative government tends to view the CTV
bureau as an important ally. The bureau often
receives scoops about government initiatives,
strategy, or, in at least one damaging case, a Senate
committee’s expenses on a trip to Dubai.
Nor is it any secret why. The Conservatives are
seeking a majority government, as they should be.
That means targeting specific swing voters with
messages about the government’s plans, priorities,
and initiatives, and, when necessary, negative
stories about the opposition. How do they reach
those swing voters who are leaning Conservative?
Not through the CBC, the Toronto Star, or CPAC.
Those are the wrong audiences. CTV, on the other
hand, reaches a large audience that is important
to the Conservative government, and it is smart to
strategically target that market. But it also makes
for one of those interesting relationships on the
Hill that you may not read about anywhere but in
Media magazine.
Simon Doyle is deputy editor of The Hill
Times, Canada’s Ottawa-based independent
news weekly that covers federal politics. l
Feature
By anDrew MiTrovica
Where’s the apology?
Journalists whose stories contributed to Maher Arar’s
misery have yet to be accountable
I
n early March, this magazine’s editor, David
McKie, told me he was in trouble.
David, as regular readers of Media know,
is inhumanely busy. He juggles editing a magazine,
people,” he wrote. “Given your willingness in the
past to take the gloves off and call the proverbial
spade a spade, would you be willing to write
something?”
decidedly parochial. “Taking the gloves off” and
“calling a spade a spade” in the notoriously thinskinned and insular world of Canadian journalism
can be risky.
Indeed, writers who are inclined to point an
accusatory finger at their brethren know they
are inviting trouble and possible retribution.
The payback can take many forms. Friendships
can end. Writers are likely to be quietly barred
from appearing in newspapers and on broadcast
networks they offend. Invective will almost
certainly be hurled your way.
“Taking the gloves
off” and “calling a
spade a spade” in
the notoriously thinskinned and insular
world of Canadian
journalism can be
risky.
Through their stories precipitated by anonymous sources, some reporters falsely labelled Maher Arar a terrorist,
a liar and a snitch. What the reporters didn’t do was offer any apologies for tarnishing his reputation.
teaching, digging for investigative stories at CBC
radio and a hectic family life. In an e-mail, David
explained that he was planning a special issue
that tackled the paltry scope of media criticism
in Canada.
“Not surprisingly, I’m having trouble finding
I briefly wondered how many other writers
David had approached before my number came
up. In any event, true to my nature and to help an
old friend and a respected colleague, I said yes.
I suppose David was having difficulty finding
people because the nation’s media landscape is
PHOTO CREDIT: CP/Jonathan Hayward
I know this because that is what happened
to me after I wrote a piece in Walrus magazine
in late 2006 that dissected the role that a slew
of reporters and editors played in smearing and
compounding the suffering of Canadian torture
survivor, Maher Arar.
Rather than recoiling from this predictable
response, I welcomed it. I understood that the
piece had satisfied one of the principal aims
of investigative journalism: to prick the fragile
sensibilities of the powerful.
From time to time, the Fourth Estate requires a
blunt reminder that it is not immune from criticism
from within the fraternity. This is particularly true
because we routinely congratulate ourselves at
awards banquets, journalism conferences and
occasionally in newsrooms that journalists are
in the noble business of monitoring power, and
of demanding transparency and accountability
from powerful individuals and public and private
institutions.
Yet, as David understands, most Canadian
writers — with the notable exception of the
courageous Linda McQuaig and a coterie
of perceptive bloggers — are unwilling to
challenge, question or criticize the nation’s media
establishment.
So, having agreed to take the plunge again, the
question David and I had to agree on was: What
would be the focus of the piece?
David suggested examining the case of a CBC
parliamentary reporter who had been disciplined
for apparently passing on questions to a Liberal
committee member probing the MulroneySchreiber affair. David was adamant. He implored
me to examine “the appalling lack of discussion”
in media quarters about the controversy. I
considered the idea, but ultimately rejected it.
I told David that there was still unfinished
business to deal with concerning the media’s
sordid involvement in the injustices visited upon
Arar. He agreed.
I pointed out to David that in the aftermath
of my Walrus piece (“Hear No Evil, Write No
Lies” won the 2007 CAJ award in the magazine
category.) I had challenged the reporters and
editors I named to participate in forums organized
by a journalism group devoted to promoting free
expression at Osgoode Hall Law School to publicly
discuss the piece.
I had hoped to trigger an honest exchange
with these reporters and editors about the issues
my story explored: responsibility, the pursuit of
verification, personal conscience. I was willing,
able and prepared to debate my criticism of their
work — face to face.
Regrettably, they declined the offer. They were
content, it seems, to have their surrogates -- friends
and lawyers -- defend their work and respond to
my challenge that they not only apologize to Arar
and his family for falsely labelling him a terrorist,
a liar and a snitch, but that they reveal the stillanonymous scoundrels who participated in a
sinister campaign to destroy Arar.
I argued in both forums that I suspected that
the reporters and editors were anxious for this
dishonourable episode in Canadian journalism
and their undeniable roles in it, to be quickly
forgotten, to be swept away by indifference and
inattention. I was determined, I said, to blunt the
inevitable admonition that ‘it was time to move
on.’
Their silence was instructive for a number of
important reasons. It appeared evident to me that
the journalists and editors I singled out — many of
them based in Ottawa -- were adept at mimicking
the tactics for avoiding accountability routinely
employed by the politicians they cover.
That self-serving strategy, I suggested, was to
weather the mild storm stirred by a reporter by
ignoring the story. My piece could be consigned
to the one-day-wonder dust-bin. The other tactic,
alluded to earlier, was to shoot the messenger. I
was stamped a “smearer,” “grandstander,” and
even a threat to Canada by allies of the reporters
I named.
I think that to their chagrin the tactics didn’t
work. The piece gathered momentum and to
use another popular phrase in our profession,
traction.
I appeared on a variety of public affairs
programs on CBC Radio and television and TVO
where I reiterated my call that these journalists
promptly apologize and reveal the identities of
powerful state officials who orchestrated the smear
campaign. It is important to note that these public
It appeared evident
to me that the
journalists and editors
I signalled out—many
of them based in
Ottawa—were adept
at mimicking the
tactics for avoiding
accountability
routinely employed
by the politicians they
cover.
institutions — CBC and TVO — played no role in
discrediting Arar.
Nevertheless, a few other writers and academics
were prompted to raise their voice.
The Toronto Star’s Haroon Siddiqui wrote
that “it was time for the media to come clean.”
The former PEN Canada head decried one
reporter’s “hatchet job…[that was] part of an
organized smear campaign by officials to first,
keep Arar in Syria and, when that failed, to ward
off an inquiry.” Siddiqui’s colleague at The Star,
Antonia Zerbisias, asked in a column “weren’t
[the media] willing conduits of the leaks that
made Arar out as a terrorist who deserved what
he got?”
But it wasn’t a journalist who offered the most
searing criticism of some of the Canadian media’s
conduct, but an academic.
In a letter published in Walrus, Professor
Reg Whitaker, policy review advisory panel
member for the Arar inquiry, condemned the
“discreditable role of certain reporters and news
organizations….in acting as willing tools of those
elements within the RCMP who attempted to
cover-up their bad behaviour by smearing Maher
Arar’s reputation.”
Whitaker went on. “Particularly odious are
the self-congratulatory accolades much of the
media has accorded Juliet O’Neill of the Ottawa
Citizen as a martyred heroine of the ‘free press,’”
he wrote. “But Ms. O’Neill is no heroine…and
she’s never shown any glimmer of recognition
of the hurt her actions caused an innocent man.
Instead, she invoked her ‘duty’ to protect her
sources, winning unjustifiable praise for her
‘courage.’”
It was a powerful letter. But like my piece, it had
little impact on the reporters and editors Siddiqui,
Zerbisias and I had previously challenged. They
remained unmoved and unrepentant.
I have often asked myself why these reporters
and editors have not done the decent thing and
publicly apologized to Arar.
At first, I reasoned that to issue an apology
might be considered legally unwise. That obstacle
evaporated when Arar made it clear that he wasn’t
interested in suing any Canadian journalist.
Others have argued that the reporters and
editors I named may have been sloppy, made
errors, or were simply having a “bad day.”
Thus, there was no need to apologize. I believe
journalists who share these evasions probably
find comfort in their ethical blindness.
To make that point I quizzed an audience
made up of journalism students, teachers, and
concerned citizens that had gathered to listen to
a debate about the Walrus story. I asked the large
group four questions.
What would happen to reporters who
committed plagiarism? Most agreed that reporters
would likely be fired. What would happen to
reporters who were found to have repeatedly
fudged expenses? Again, the consensus was
that they would be fired. What would happen to
reporters who repeatedly arrived to work late?
Fired. So, plagiarism, fraud and lateness, the
audience agreed, are firing offences.
Finally, I asked: What has happened to the
Canadian reporters and editors who repeatedly
labelled an innocent man a terrorist, a liar
and a snitch? The answer: no one was fired,
reprimanded, or disciplined and apparently there
still is no need to apologize.
That is unpardonable.
Andrew Mitrovica teaches in the
Internationally Trained Writers Program at
Sheridan College in Oakville, Ontario. He is
a contributing editor at Walrus magazine and
a seven-time winner of the CAJ award for
investigative reporting. l
Feature
By cecil roSner
Thirty years of the CAJ
The evolution of the CAJ is critical to the development of
investigative journalism in Canada
E
xactly 30 years ago, a brief encounter
between two investigative reporters
was the spark that led to the
establishment of Canada’s most important
organization of journalists. The place was
a CBC studio in Toronto, and the occasion
was a routine interview with an author on
a book tour. Henry Aubin had adapted a
series of articles he wrote for the Montreal
Gazette into a book called City for Sale,
a groundbreaking examination of land
ownership in Montreal. As he walked
into the studio, he met CBC journalist
Jock Ferguson. The men realized they
had a few things in common. Both were
doing provocative journalism that was
calling powerful institutions to account
and challenging the status quo. And
they were both encountering resistance
from their respective managements. The
enthusiasm to rock the boat and push the
boundaries of conventional journalism
was not always eagerly shared by private
owners and public sector managers.
Ferguson, in fact, soon found himself
fired after pushing too aggressively on a
civic corruption story, even though his
report turned out to be right. The two
men decided a new organization of likeminded practitioners was needed, and
they resolved to build it.
Aubin and Ferguson began contacting
other journalists, and by June 1978 a
group of 20 reporters got together and
published a brochure proposing that a
new organization called the Centre for
Investigative Journalism be created. “The
Centre would try to end the isolation
between investigative reporters across
Rosner’s new book Behind the Headlines tracks the evolution of investigative journalism in Canada and the origins of the
the country,” said the brochure. “The
Canadian Association of Journalists.
Centre would provide expert legal advice
to journalists or their employers. As it
stands now, many employers have inadequate
and encourage a more receptive public. The
more than a decade later it renamed itself the
understanding of the application of libel law
world was in motion, resistance to American
Canadian Association of Journalists.
and the Official Secrets Act.” Canadians were
intervention in Vietnam was growing, and
The
1970s
witnessed
an
explosion
of
following the lead of their U.S. counterparts, who
there was an upsurge in the youth and student
investigative
journalism
in
Canada
and
many
had successfully formed Investigative Reporters
movement. U.S. administrations could no longer
other
parts
of
the
world.
To
attribute
this
process
and Editors in 1975. Further planning through
command widespread trust, and a credibility gap
solely
to
Watergate
would
be
to
miss
the
unique
1978 led to the new organization’s founding
emerged. Independent journalists like I.F. Stone
convergence
of
social
and
political
forces
in
conference in Montreal early in 1979. The Centre
challenged conventional wisdoms, and alternative
the 1960s that began to embolden journalists
for Investigative Journalism was born, and a little
newspapers and magazines began applying
investigative techniques to their journalism. Still,
the mainstream media were slow to follow. When
Seymour Hersh uncovered evidence of deliberate
atrocities in Vietnam, he couldn’t convince any
large American magazine or broadcaster to
touch the story. Hersh eventually used a small
and obscure news agency to distribute his report
about My Lai.
With incidents like My Lai and the revelation
of the Pentagon Papers exposing U.S. policy in
Vietnam, mainstream media outlets could no
longer ignore investigative stories that challenged
the status quo. Suddenly investigative work became
a marketable commodity, just as it had been
during the turn-of-the-century era of American
muckrakers like Lincoln Steffens, Upton Sinclair
and Ida Tarbell. Newspapers and broadcast outlets
rushed to form teams to do investigative work, and
this process only accelerated with the Watergate
revelations. In Canada, there were indications that
investigative journalism was becoming part of the
permanent mainstream landscape. The Globe and
Mail was breaking stories ranging from municipal
corruption to systemic abuse by Toronto police.
Still, any
commodity
is subject
to the pressures
of the marketplace,
and investigative
journalism
was no
exception.
The CBC probed deeply into organized crime with
its Connections series. And a host of reporters
uncovered widespread dirty tricks by the RCMP,
eventually leading to a royal commission and the
disbandment of the force’s security service.
Still, any commodity is subject to the pressures
of the marketplace, and investigative journalism
was no exception. The expansion of the genre saw
many people practising it without proper training
or procedures, leading to some spectacular
mistakes and catastrophic lawsuits. By the
beginning of the 1980s, increased consolidation
and monopolization of the Canadian media meant
fewer outlets and editorial voices. High interest
rates and economic pressures during the same
era led to rationalization and layoffs, and private
media owners began looking at other forms of
stories. News managers often see investigative
work as time consuming and unproductive, and
potentially dangerous given the legal implications.
By 1982 the CIJ Bulletin was reporting that
“Investigative journalism on the country’s dailies,
always in fragile health, is wheezing worse than
ever as the strangle is put to editorial budgets.”
Multi-million dollar defamation lawsuits have only
made some media outlets even more hesitant.
Since then, investigative journalism has waxed
and waned. One year a newspaper or station will
form a team and trumpet its muckraking, only
to shut the process down a year or two later. The
general trend, though, is towards far less scrutiny
than in the past. Thirty years ago every Canadian
city had a number of reporters scrutinizing
every city hall and legislature across the country,
watching, recording and paying attention. Some
of those same places go largely unnoticed by the
media today. But these are the realities of media
enterprises that see circulation and audience
growth, and the bottom line, as the key drivers of
decision-making surrounding content.
What Aubin and Ferguson realized 30 years
ago is that the interests of the journalists who
are passionate about holding powerful forces to
account are not always congruent with the interests
of the institutions where they happen to work.
That is why they recognized the need to establish
an independent organization of journalists that
crossed institutional lines, one that would support
and enhance the genre of investigative journalism
without having to worry about profits or audience
growth. After all, there is an inherent contradiction
in supporting a form of journalism that challenges
the powerful and tilts against the status quo
when a media institution is both powerful and a
pillar of that same status quo. Sometimes, when
the commodity is hot and investigative work is
in vogue, that contradiction can be overlooked.
But it tends to resurface at critical moments, as
many investigative journalists who have come into
conflict with their own institutions have realized
over the years.
There remains a strong contingent of talented
investigative journalists in Canada, working for
organizations large and small, who are dedicated
to looking for the truth and holding power to
account. The need to exchange experiences,
provide mutual support, and stand firm in the
face of every kind of pressure is as strong today
as it was 30 years ago.
Cecil Rosner is Managing Editor of CBC
English Radio & Television in Manitoba,
and the author of a new book on the history
of investigative journalism called Behind the
Headlines: A History of Investigative Journalism
in Canada. l
Wider, deeper, faster
Canwest News Service draws on the skills of more than 1200 journalists across
Canada and around the world to bring audiences the most comprehensive
news package in the country.
Canwest News Service is Canada’s leading news organization committed
to quality journalism delivered when and where today’s readers want it.
Contact us at 613.369.4848 or cns@canwest.com
Feature
By caTherine Murray
Lost in Translation?
There must be a better way to bridge the gap between the ethnic and
mainstream media
T
Korean and Farsi media are the fastest-growing.
SFU then conducted a content analysis of 20
ethnic media outlets, and compared them to seven
of their counterparts in the mainstream media,
generating a database of more than1500 stories.
Not surprisingly, since
the dominant assumption in
the industry has been that
ethnic media are “niche” or
“complementary” players, the
study during the sample period
of May of 2007 showed the ethnic
media did what the Vancouver
Sun and Province did not: they
had significantly higher coverage
of international news from the
respective country of origin. The
surprise was the more nuanced
and intensive focus on local news,
concentrating on issues of direct
relevance to recent immigrants
such as social policy and programs,
health, education, cultural events,
religion and employment news.
This is the news new Canadians
can use—and ethnic media do
a better job at providing it than
the main local papers such as the
Vancouver Sun, for example.
Unlike mainstream media, ethnic
media provided very little national
or provincial coverage (certainly
less than 10% of the space ) on
their front pages or at the top of
the TV newscasts.
Assuming a new citizen reads
or watches news in both the
mainstream and ethnic media, then,
she or he will receive a balanced
news diet. But such assumptions
are false: a recent study of 3000
new Canadians in MTV (the major
There is some very good journalism in the ethnic media, but awareness and recognition of quality ethnic journalism is low.
metropolises), by Kaan Yigit of the
Toronto-based Solutions Research
Group, found that half of Chinese respondents
in new languages to serve those arriving: Farsi,
conventional directories identify—and employing
do not follow any news beyond their language of
Korean in addition to Mandarin, Cantonese and
an estimated 1100 journalists or freelancers. As
origin. These immigrants are caught between here
Punjabi already widely available in cities like
many as one-third of the print sources in the
and there—existing in what some academics call a
Vancouver. What do we know about this wave of
unregulated media sector were started after the
“translocal” orientation with little insight provided
new talent, and how is it changing the landscape
year 2000, often reflecting the aspirations of a new
about the larger adopted country. Surprisingly, the
of Canadian journalism? The Centre for Policy
business class of immigrants. Turnover is high,
oldest and largest Asian-language media outlets
Studies on Culture and Communities at Simon
with 20 outlets going under and nine starting up
originating in BC carried very little about Canada’s
Fraser University set out to learn about the BC
during the study period that produced the report,
war effort in Afghanistan, a major story in the
media produced in other than English, French
Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Media in BC.
he last census revealed growing numbers
of immigrants and visible minorities in
many major cities. Many are arriving with
education, skills and capital to build their new life
in Canada. More media ventures are starting up
or aboriginal languages, or targeting specific
ethnocultural groups.
The findings were surprising. The sector was
much larger than supposed with 144 ethnic print,
radio and TV outlets—almost four times as many as
English-language media in the sample period, and
a ballot issue in talk of impending election threats
at the time. When queried, journalists confirmed
many ethnic media accept there is a “special”
(informal) news practice featuring more Canadian
national or provincial coverage in place during
election time—but this was beyond the scope
of the current study. Even more interestingly,
some outlets like the new Vancouver M-Channel,
tried simultaneous translation of debates in
the provincial election, an essential service to
immigrants who do not speak English.
Significantly, different news practices were
found. Ethnic media in general, but especially
print media, are much less likely to put staff copy
at the front of the news line-up. Twenty percent of
items—especially in Korean and Punjabi media—
have no by-line, suggesting reliance on Internet
sources and different copyright awareness. In
print or on air, news items tend to be shorter.
Headlines are just as sensational. Yet Chinese and
Korean media appear less value-laden, editorial or
personalized in their writing style than the Punjabi
media.
Other potentially disturbing signs may be
found in sharply different news agendas across
language groups. Diversity is good—but too much
of it challenges the capacity of any citizen to form a
coherent world view of life in Canada. Even more
important, local news about other ethnic groups
was rare, suggesting a tendency to in-group
orientation. For example, Korean, Mandarin and
Cantonese media paid little attention to the Air
India inquiry in May of 2007, despite important
revelations that dominated English media
coverage. By contrast, news about a Korean
American youth killing students at a U.S. campus
was muted in other languages.
Community leaders, journalists and analysts
interviewed by the Simon Fraser University team
in all linguistic communities expressed concern
about the training and credentials of journalists
in ‘other’ language groups—but especially among
young aspiring journalists, and the new wave who
had arrived since 2000. The problem for a new
journalist on entry is difficult. The TV channel
M (whose purchase by Rogers is pending CRTC
approval) and Shaw’s Multicultural Channel are
pioneering acceptance of foreign credentials and
offer on-the-job training in their news studios,
working at cultural remediation. But breaking
into the mainstream media is hard. Canadian
credentials are expected. Yet a look around the
J-schools in the Lower Mainland reveals they are
still predominantly white.
There is some very good journalism in the
ethnic media, but awareness and recognition of
quality ethnic journalism is low. The Jack Webster
Foundation in B.C. offers awards only for stories
in the Chinese media, overlooking some of the
fastest-growing cultural groups. To the best of
our knowledge, no award or other incentive for
investigative reporting among third-language
groups is available in Canada, suggesting a new
intercultural mandate should be forged for the
Michener Foundation Award series and others
for 2010. Experiments of the type begun in
Europe by Mediam’Rad, which held a simulated
intercultural editorial meeting to explore the way
different cultural perceptions may influence news
values and news selection and identify ways to
change. The Council of Europe has made 2008 the
year to encourage a number of such roundtables
across European cities.
The SFU study found that the mainstreamethnic gulf is still wide: the verdict from many
participants interviewed was that underrepresentation and misrepresentation of Canada’s
multicultural reality in the mainstream English
news media are as serious today as in the past.
Mainstream media are diversifying in the board
The underrepresentation and
misrepresentation
of Canada’s
multicultural
reality in the
mainstream
English press
are as serious
today as
in the past.
offices or at the news desk at a glacial pace. The
degree of their oligopoly power is significant. By
contrast, the ethnic media sector (except for TV)
is widely held, quite competitive, and like the
community news sector in Canada, the last bastion
of a competitive news culture. However, many
new ethnic print or magazine ventures are still
financially precarious. They may be vulnerable to
selling out, or establishing partnerships to swap
editorial content. Co-ventures of the type between
Canadian Express, a new B.C. Korean paper, and
CanWest are hopeful, as they promise to repackage
and translate relevant English news for B.C.’s
Korean Community. However, they also represent
a hidden face of editorial concentration, without
questioning how news is produced (or why, for
example, CanWest has only one correspondent in
Asia who does limited travel) or what can be done
to improve news quality in both languages.
J-schools have been slow in diversifying
training for new immigrants to break into the
business, and journalists have been slow to identify
the need to develop a news code on intercultural
reporting (for news directors’ associations, for
example).
Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Media in
BC represents one initiative to begin to build a
culture of media criticism in Canada. University
researchers, Civil Society Organizations, and
journalist organizations such as the Canadian
Association of Journalists must push for an
independent media analysis capacity, much like
that established by the Pew Trust and issue report
cards on the media. In this country, the Bellsponsored Canadian Media Research Consortium
attempts to do this, but its efforts need to be
more concentrated. Timely, regular research
should feed into debates among professionals
about their standards and about what represents
quality coverage, and garner recognition
for the professional rigour and intercultural
responsiveness of their work.
Canada needs Mediam’Rad-style roundtables
to compare different news values, and orientations
to democratic news culture. J-schools must revise
their curricula, and reach out to other policy,
political science and communication schools to
build a longer-term research program.
A healthy news culture requires strong
professional credentials, a vigilant competition
policy (preventing the swallowing up of diverse
ethnic media and addressing intergenerational
inequity in media chances afforded different
ethnocultural groups) and an active self-regulatory
system which is both more open and transparent,
and more responsive to changing public needs.
While mainstream (and mostly white) policy focus
has been on the need for a code of journalistic
independence to protect against growing oligopoly
power, much more discussion is needed.
What defines irrelevant racialization of news
coverage? What is systemic under-representation
and why does it occur? Without multicultural
dialogues to understand the impact immigration
is having on intercultural reporting in Canada’s
news culture, most journalism today is lost in
translation.
Catherine Murray is a Professor at
SFU’s Centre for Policy Studies on Culture
and Communities and co-author of Cultural
Diversity and Ethnic Media in BC. She is indebted
to the Department of Canadian Heritage
for the funds to collate the database and to
co-investigators Sherry Yu and Daniel Ahadi.
Special thanks to Faiza Khan, BA Hon. SFU,
for the title allusion. For more information see
http://www.bcethnicmedia.ca. l
Writer’s
toolBox
By Don giBB
It’s time to put your writing on a diet
Tight writing is not just about cutting words, it’s also about getting the
most out of them
T
his is a column about dieting. How, with
good mental exercise, you can learn to trim
the fat from your writing.
Redundant words. Clichés. Bureaucratic
jargon. Too many people saying the same thing
or not much of anything. Bloated quotes often
regurgitated from a digital voice recorder.
But like any diet, you have to be committed and
accept the challenge.
Easy to say, harder to do. Hey, hanging around
with a personal computer hasn’t done wonders
for our writing. It devours words, gobbling up
everything you give it with megabytes to spare.
Then, every once in a while, a memo makes the
rounds of newsrooms suggesting it’s time to write
tighter because of a shrinking newshole. Today’s
slimmer broadsheets have prompted a renewed call
for brevity. Tabloid and broadcast writers already
know the limits of space or air time.
kkk
Try mental exercise #1. Tighten these:
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
with the possible exception of …
due to the fact that …
he totally lacked the ability to …
until such time as …
at this point in time …
kkk
Writers will convince themselves there’s no
point in interviewing too many people because
they can’t use them anyway. But the reason for
interviewing many people is to understand the
story—not to include everyone. And that presents
another concern, writers tell me. If they have spent
an hour with an interview subject, they feel obliged
to give them at least a few paragraphs. This is a poor
reason to include someone in your story. Just thank
those you interview. Tell them they may or may not
be part of your story, but the information they have
provided has been crucial to your understanding
of the story. You’ll feel less guilt and you’ll be able
to sleep at night.
As William Blundell (The Art and Craft of
Feature Writing) says:
“Too many stories are cluttered by the
inclusion of too many people. The few doing
or saying something interesting are buried by
the many who are just beating their gums.”
point adding colour because it will just get cut
anyway. Leaving out an unnecessary fact or two or
condensing what someone says into one sentence
rather than two allows you to add colour. Colour
should not be sacrificed for another droning
comment. And remember that colour can be a
single word or a few words.
point including quotes because they’ll get cut
anyway. Quotes add life to a story, but too often
reporters over quote—one of the major drawbacks
of using a voice recorder. Bloated quotes are as
sinful as baggy sentences. There’s no need to set
up a quote or use a quote that repeats what the
previous sentence said.
Example:
Although the city did not declare a state
of emergency, Mayor Smith said at a press
conference yesterday that the city was “on
high alert.”
Smith said: “We are not declaring a state of
emergency.”
Tight writing, however, should not be seen
as an attempt to squeeze the life out of a story. It
should be seen as a way to remove words, phrases,
sentences and complete paragraphs that are not
doing their job. They made a decision should be
they decided. They began to shovel the snow
should be they shovelled the snow. When you
attack a series of sentences in a row that are bloated
with excess language, you’ll feel the satisfaction of
cutting the fat. Why force readers to hack their way
through the undergrowth of wordy sentences?
So, ask yourself: Is every word working? Can
any thought be expressed in fewer words?
kkk
Mental exercise #2. Tighten these:
6) He put the blame squarely on Harper’s
shoulders.
7) The classroom is located on the second floor of
the building.
8) The house was completely destroyed at 7 p.m.
Monday night.
kkk
Every story should have a clear focus. Writers
who fail to kick-start their stories find themselves
meandering and wandering aimlessly—often
repeating themselves—until they run out of
steam.
U.S. writing coach Don Murray describes the
news writer as a territorial animal with a primitive
instinct to use up as much newsprint as possible.
But the stories that survive, he says, are usually
short, precisely limited and clearly focused. “Most
good stories say one thing. They tell not of a battle,
but of a soldier.”
Knowing what the story is before you begin to
write is the first step to tight writing.
These brief excerpts from two writers show
that colour, detail and lively quotes need not be
sacrificed for space. In the first piece, Julie Sullivan,
writing for the Spokane-Review in Spokane,
Washington, tells the story of a 17-year-old drug
addict in about 325 compelling words.
She’ll make $100 a day getting into cars
with strangers, but she can spend twice that
much on cocaine. Her last meal was a box of
macaroni and cheese, made with water, no
butter, no milk.
“I like the high,” she says softly. “It
keeps me from being depressed all the
time.”
In this second piece, Thane Burnett, of the
Toronto Sun, tells the story of the death of a man’s
wife when a truck rams into their house. It, too, was
told in little more than 300 words.
Fan Yan Wong laboured yesterday in the
home where his wife died – working without
food or rest because the effort meant he could
delay telling his children the awful truth.
“They keep asking about their mother.
They keep asking and all I can do is lie,”
said Wong as he stood among the rubble
of his North York townhouse destroyed by
a runaway gravel truck less than 24 hours
earlier.
Short, punchy, clear … and colourful. Neither
writer sacrifices colour and both keep their quotes
short and to the point of the story.
Ask yourself: What is my story about? Try to
sum it up in a word, a few words or a sentence.
Then, as you write, ask: Does this detail, quote,
or fact advance the story I want to tell? And if it
doesn’t, have the guts to delete it.
kkk
Mental exercise #3. Tighten these sentences:
9) MP Judy Jones toured the building this morning
after being informed of the situation. After
spending about two hours in the building, she
said she couldn’t work in the building because
of the fumes. (A story on federal government
workers who say renovations to their building
are causing health problems.)
10)If a woman senses she is in a dangerous situation,
Jones said, the best thing for her to do is to get
inside or if possible get to a phone and contact
security.
kkk
Tight writing is a challenge. It can’t be achieved
by simply eliminating a word here or there. And
editors don’t do writers any favours by squeezing
paragraphs together so that white space (or
breathing space) is sacrificed for a densely-worded
story.
OK, let’s shorten the sentence above:
Tight writing can’t be achieved by eliminating
a few words. Editors shouldn’t sacrifice breathing
space by squeezing paragraphs together to create
densely-worded stories. (Forty-one words reduced
to 23 words without losing the meaning.)
The goal is to remove secondary detail that
doesn’t advance the story; to avoid repetition by
removing an idea expressed in a previous sentence;
and to streamline by combining two sentences into
one.
But don’t ignore the little words that fill our
stories and can be easily excised without affecting
content. Strunk and White (The Elements of
Style) call them the little qualifiers or leeches that
suck the life out of stories: very, quite, extremely,
possibly, somewhat, basically, totally.
And the word “that.” See how many times you
can remove it from your own copy without affecting
the meaning of any sentence. In fact make “that”
your starting point.
Writers restricted by a word count or column
inches should write without obsessing over length.
Focusing on length during the writing process can
be a distraction because writers will think too
much about what to omit. Write it—then rewrite
it. That’s not to say that a 400-word limit should
come out as 1,000 words in the first go-around.
But once writers have a first draft, it’s easier to see
what to cut.
The more writers engage in this process, the
sharper news judgment and writing become.
As William Zinsser (On Writing Well) notes:
“Writing improves in direct ratio to the number of
things we can keep out that shouldn’t be there.”
Tight writing shouldn’t be seen as a death
sentence to creative writing. It’s a chance to
improve clarity and rhythm by eliminating jargon,
clichés and padding that bog down a story and
slow its pace.
It’s a diet worth trying for the sake of bettering
your writing and for the sake of the busy reader
who finds it all too easy to turn the page.
kkk
Possible answers to mental exercises above:
except
because
he couldn’t
until
now
He blamed Harper
The classroom is on the second floor.
The house was destroyed at 7 p.m. Monday (or
Monday night).
9) MP Judy Jones, who toured the building today,
she said she couldn’t work there because of the
fumes.
10)A woman who senses danger, Jones said, should
get inside or phone security.
Don Gibb teaches newspaper reporting at
Ryerson University’s School of Journalism. He
apologizes for writing such a lengthy column on
tight writing. Feel free to edit. He can be reached at
dgibb@ryerson.ca. l
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
8)
TIPS ON TIGHT WRITING
Preparing the story:
1) Organize first. This makes the difference between good short writing
and lazy short writing. It’s also the main reason good short writing
takes a long time. (USA Today writer.)
2) Shorter stories don’t mean fewer interviews. You need as many as
it takes to understand the topic and explain it to readers, viewers or
listeners. Some of those you interview won’t make it into the story, but
they might be essential in helping you understand the piece.
3) Exercise harsh news judgment. Constantly ask yourself: Does this
advance the story? Am I sticking to the main theme.
4) A story needs a clear focus. Cover a single issue well.
5) Ask lots of follow-up questions related to the main theme. This will
keep you on topic and help you understand the story.
6) Do not move on in your interview questions until you fully understand
each topic. If you do this, your questions will be sharper and so will
your focus.
7) Don’t get locked into using your voice recorder. Overuse of a recorder
makes it more difficult to use good news judgment and to paraphrase.
If you use a recorder, simply go back to retrieve a good quote.
Writing the story:
8) Watch for a sentence that repeats what the previous sentence said
or says something readers don’t need to know or can figure out for
themselves.
9) Never have two or more people saying the same thing, but be sure to
get all sides into the story.
10) Write without looking at your notes. Write quickly. The story is in your
head, not in your notes. Slow writing usually means adding stuff.
12) Justify the need for everything in your story: Does the reader need to
know this? Does this advance the story? Why is this important?
12) Make quotes short and punchy.
Rewriting:
13) Fighting clutter is like fighting weeds—the writer is always slightly
behind. Look for the clutter and prune it ruthlessly. Be grateful for
everything you can throw away.
14) Ask the tough questions: Is every word working? Can any thought
be expressed in fewer words? Is anything pompous or pretentious?
Are you hanging on to something useless just because you think it’s
beautiful?
15) Omit the little qualifiers: a bit, a little, sort of, kind of rather, pretty
much, in a sense, quite, very … and more.
16) Most first drafts can be cut. They are heavy with words and phrases
that don’t serve any function.
17) Reporters suffer form the “cramming impulse”—the compulsion to
mash as much detail into the available space as possible. They spend a
lot of time and skill and ego collecting stuff, and they want to squeeze
it all in.
18) Review a story you wrote a month ago. Rewrite it.
19) Read short stories and features.
20) Read your stories aloud. See how they sound. Rewrite when they feel
wordy or you stumble over clumsy sentences and paragraphs.
Don Gibb turned to William Zinsser (On Writing Well), Strunk and White
(The Elements of Style), and Don Fry (Coaching Writers) to supplement his
own ideas.
Student Journalist
Hong Kong Fellowship
Exploring Hong Kong – Asia’s world city
Application Deadline: September 15, 2008
Hong Kong, Asia’s world city, is a Special Administrative Region
stories about Hong Kong within six months upon completion
of the People’s Republic of China, run by Hong Kong people
of the trip in the local media or in their university/school
under the “One Country, Two Systems” principle. Hong Kong
publications. They will have complete editorial freedom.
is one of the most open, externally oriented economies in the
world. It is also considered the springboard to the growing
China market.
The award is open to any journalism student who is currently
in a recognized university or college level journalism program.
Applicants must be a paid-in-full member in good standing
Hong Kong has been rated the world’s freest economy by the
of the CAJ. Non-members may take out membership upon
Heritage Foundation, and Fraser Institute.
making an application. For application procedures, please
What makes Hong Kong tick as a great world city are: its
visit the CAJ website at www.caj.ca
unrivalled location; its liberal investment regime; its low tax
Selection of the successful candidates will be made and
regime; its transparent common law legal system and rule of
announced in early-October. The visit program must be
law; its world class infrastructure; its free flow of information;
completed before the end of March 2009.
its entrepreneurial spirit; and a truly international lifestyle.
Application must reach:
Student journalists, who are interested in seeing Hong Kong
The Canadian Association of Journalists
to gain first-hand knowledge, are invited to apply for the
Algonquin College
“Student Journalist Hong Kong Fellowship”, organized
1385 Woodroffe Avenue, B-224
by the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (Canada) in
Ottawa ON K2G 1V8
association with the Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ).
Two student journalists will be selected by CAJ each year.
Each will be awarded a package including a five-day official
visit program with an economy class air ticket and hotel
accommodation. When in Hong Kong, the winners will have
the opportunity to visit various points of interest, and meet
with people of diverse views and backgrounds. The winning
student journalists must publish or broadcast at least three
By Monday, September 15, 2008
For enquiries, please contact
Mr Stephen Siu, Assistant Director (Public Relations) of the
Hong Kong Economic & Trade Office at (416) 924-7374 or
email: stephen_siu@hketotoronto.gov.hk or
John Dickins, Executive Director, CAJ at (613) 526-8061 or
email: canadianjour@magma.ca
For
the record
By aMir aTTaran
War’s first casuality
When think tanks produce propaganda, at the very least, credible
public intellectuals should disclose the source of their funding
issues.” And reach out he does—eloquently, but
not always disclosing that he is funded by DND. He
made no disclosure when he testified to Parliament
that the government’s Afghanistan policy “is the
right mission for Canada and the right mission for
the Afghan people.” He also made no disclosure
in a published op-ed where he praised former
Conservative defence minister Gordon O’Connor
as “an outstanding success,” and assailed “years of
Liberal [party] neglect of . . .defence policy and the
Canadian Forces.” I don’t ever want this professor
to stop saying and writing what he believes. But I do
want Canadians who encounter his interventions to
know how he has been funded.
That is why, at the very least, credible public
intellectuals owe disclosure to their public.
But the government, too, should know better.
Rather than have DND dole out cash to public
T
he war in Afghanistan is one of ideas and
ideologies. Ideologies, in that the Pashtun
extremist worldview is far from our own.
Ideas, in that our society is likely to prevail only
if it makes wiser and cleverer decisions than
theirs. That is why, when one adds up Canada’s
advantages in this war, there is none greater than
our values of inquiry and debate.
But recently, a new threat has emerged. The
Department of National Defence is intruding on
academic financing, spending millions of dollars
sponsoring think tanks and scholars to offer up
agreeable commentary.When these intellectuals
comment, they are not always quick to disclose that
the military funds them.
Take the Conference of Defence Associations,
a think tank that got $500,000 from DND last year.
That money comes not with strings, but with an
entire leash. A current DND policy reads that to
receive money, CDA must “support activities that
give evidence of contributing to Canada’s national
policies.” Apparently, if CDA’s activities were
neutral and unbiased, or even-handedly supported
and questioned government policy, DND would
refuse to pay!
CDA gets away with shilling because it is so
discreet. Nowhere on its website does CDA disclose
its half-million dollars of DND sponsorship.
The Harper government knows what the
money is for, because cabinet reviewed the funding
agreement between DND and CDA, and it has been
secret ever since. Nonetheless, Maclean’s got
CDA’s executive director, Colonel Alain Pellerin, to
admit that the contract obliges it “to write a number
of op-eds to the press”—propaganda paid for by
you and me.
More disturbing still is the manner in which
DND spends money to elicit friendly comment by
Canadian scholars.
Most people would find it strange that DND
sponsors the salaries, research, travel and tuition
of dozens of professors, post doctoral fellows and
graduate students. But DND’s Security and Defence
Forum does exactly this. The list of Canadian
universities receiving more than half a million
dollars of SDF money is extensive: York University
($580,000),UQAM ($630,000), Wilfrid Laurier
University ($630,000), Université Laval ($655,000),
McGill ($680,000), UBC ($680,000), University of
Manitoba($680,000), UNB ($680,000), Carleton
University ($780,000), Dalhousie University
($780,000), University of Calgary ($780,000) and
Queen’s University ($1,480,000).
An Afghan boy who was wounded in an explosion
recovers in a hospital in Herat, Afghanistan,
Sunday, June 29, 2008. An old land mine exploded
in Herat killing one child and injuring four others
police said.
What’s the money for? It’s not for the technical
work that militaries obviously require—building
better airplanes, for example. Instead, it sponsors
policy scholars, who create the ideas, news and
views that shape Canadians’ perception of the
military and the war. And the evidence suggests that
the military and government have politicized some
SDF grants. The same bureaucrat who administers
SDF grants to scholars also manages DND’s liaison
with cabinet and Parliament.
When DND needs a kind word in Parliament
or the media—presto!—an SDF-sponsored
scholar often appears, without disclosing his or
her financial link.
There is one Canadian professor who received
an $825,000 SDF grant.
For that money, DND expects the professor to
“conduct outreach activities with the Canadian
public . . . and Parliament about security and defence
PHOTO CREDIT: AP/Fraidoon Pooyaa
The Department of
National Defence is
intruding on academic
financing, spending
millions of dollars
sponsoring think tanks
and scholars to offer up
agreeable commentary.
intellectuals—and risk tainting their scholarship
and their conferences—it should give the Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council that
money to award grants on an arm’s-length basis.
This is how other public intellectuals in Canada
get funded.
Parliament, the Auditor-General and journalists
need a watching brief on this file. As the war in
Afghanistan becomes bigger and longer, it will
prove dangerous to let DND sponsor intellectuals.
Canada needs fresh ideas—not groupthink—
to win.
Amir Attaran, Canada Research Chair in Law,
Population Health and Global Development Policy
at the University of Ottawa, is funded by the Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council—and
not by DND. This is an edited version of a piece
that originally ran in The Globe and Mail on
February 21. l
legal
opinion part one
By John Miller
Keeping restraints on the messenger
The Ontario Court of Appeal was right: Press freedom is not absolute
W
hich is more important —
fighting crime or writing about
it?
Judging from the overwrought reaction
of Canada’s largest association of journalists,
you’d think freedom of the press should
always come first, even trumping the legal
tools that police need to find out whodunit.
The Canadian Association of Journalists,
representing 1,500 members, says it is
dismayed by an Ontario Court of Appeal
ruling, released on Feb. 29, that ordered the
National Post to turn over leaked secret
documents to police investigating former
prime minister Jean Chrétien’s role in the
so-called Shawinigate affair.
CAJ president Mary Agnes Welch said:
“Police are on a witch hunt to root out a whistleblower who exposed important and embarrassing
information. … If that isn’t an attempt to
subvert the relationship between journalists and
confidential sources, I don’t know what is.”
The CAJ believes that journalists should have
the unfettered right “to protect the identity of
their confidential sources, period.”
I disagree. A closer look at the facts of this case
show that the judges got the balance between press
freedom and crime detection just about right.
They overturned a lower court ruling that
quashed an RCMP search warrant for documents
that Post reporter Andrew McIntosh received
from an anonymous source. According to the
documents, a hotel in Mr. Chrétien’s riding,
L’Auberge Grand-Mère, had an outstanding debt
of $23,040 to “JAC Consultants” during the time
Mr. Chrétien admitted lobbying the Business
Development Bank of Canada to approve a loan
to the inn. “JAC Consultants” is a Chrétien family
holding company.
If genuine, the document proved that Mr.
Chrétien had a conflict of interest. But both Mr.
Chrétien and the bank claimed the document was
a forgery. The RCMP asked for a warrant so it
could determine whether it was. Their way was
blocked when Madam Justice Mary Lou Benotto
of the Ontario Superior Court ruled in 2004 that
the request violated press freedom guarantees in
the Charter of Rights.
A key fact accepted by both Judge Benotto
and the appeals court panel was that police had
reasonable and probable grounds to suspect the
document was a forgery. It was also no trivial
If genuine, the document proved that Mr. Chrétien had a
conflict of interest.
crime. As Mr. Justice John Laskin wrote in the
3-0 opinion overturning Judge Benotto: “This is
an especially grave and heinous crime. Assuming
the document was forged, either the forger or
some other person sent it to the National Post to
create controversy and undermine the authority
of a sitting prime minister of Canada.”
It follows then, Judge Laskin wrote, that “as a
starting point, press organizations and journalists,
like everyone else, owe a duty to give relevant
evidence in a case before the courts.”
What the CAJ and some other critics of the
appeals court ruling fail to recognize is that Judge
Laskin did, in fact, write a strong statement
acknowledging the importance of reporters being
able to protect their sources, even though there is
A closer look
at the facts
of this case show
that the
judges got the
balance between
press freedom
and crime detection
just about right.
PHOTO CREDIT: Peter Bregg
currently no law allowing them to do so.
“If the journalist-informant relationship
is undermined,” Judge Laskin said,
“society as a whole is affected. It is through
confidential sources that matters of great
public importance are made known. As
corporate and public power increase, the
ability of the average citizen to affect his or
her world depends upon the information
disseminated by the press. To deprive the
media of an important tool in the gathering
of news would affect society as a whole.
The relationship is one that should be
fostered.”
But clearly not in all cases. Judge Laskin
continued: “This does not mean that press
organizations or journalists are immune
from valid searches under s. 8 of the Charter. And
s. 2(b) does not guarantee that journalists have
an automatic right to protect the confidentiality
of their sources. The court must ensure that the
privacy interests of the press are limited as little as
possible. But the court must also balance against
the privacy interest of the press, the state or other
societal interests in getting at the truth.”
In other words, in this case, an RCMP forgery
investigation was more important than Mr.
McIntosh and the Post protecting the identity
of its anonymous source. It’s hard to imagine
many Canadians arguing strongly against that
concept.
The Post, which has had the document since
2001, was never able to verify if it was genuine or
forged and, in fact, did not publish the damaging
allegation against Mr. Chrétien. It was published
first by other media in the context of Mr.
Chrétien’s denial. So you’d think the newspaper
would welcome the chance for the police to do a
thorough investigation to find out whether the
newspaper was duped.
This case should also cause journalists to be
wary about giving sources blanket, unconditional
promises to protect their identities, which Mr.
McIntosh, an award-winning investigative
journalist now working in the United States, did
in this case.
John Miller is a professor of journalism
at Ryerson University and a member of the
Canadian Association of Journalists. A version
of this article also appeared in The Globe and
Mail. l
legal
opinion part tWo
By Dean JoBB
Blanket protection
Two recent court decisions should give journalists pause to consider the
deals they offer source
T
he National Post’s Andrew McIntosh is
not entitled to protect the identity of a key
source who aided his investigation into
former prime minister Jean Chrétien’s financial
affairs. Ken Peters of the Hamilton Spectator
defies a court order to protect one of his sources,
yet cannot be punished for contempt of court.
Ontario’s Court of Appeal issued these seemingly
contradictory rulings within a three-week span
earlier this year. The result is a partial victory for
press freedom and some understandable confusion
about whether Canadian journalists have the right
to protect a confidential source.
First, the good news.
The country’s most
influential appellate
court has recognized
that journalists may
have to promise to
protect the identity of
sources in order to do
their jobs.
“It requires no blind
The need to identify Andrew McIntosh’s source—and
solve what Justice Laskin termed the “grave and heinous
crime” of using a forged document to try to force a prime
minister from office—outweighed any claim of privilege.
leap of faith,” Justice Robert J. Sharpe noted in the
Peters ruling, “to understand that a person who
gives information to a journalist only on condition
that his identity will not be revealed will be less
likely to give that information if he knows that,
despite the journalists’ assurance, his identity may
in fact be disclosed.”
His colleague, Justice John Laskin, seconded
that motion in the National Post ruling. The
“relationship between a journalist and a confidential
source should be diligently fostered for the public
good,” he wrote, adding that “some matters of
public interest could not be thoroughly investigated
or investigated at all without confidential sources of
information.”
Journalists and media lawyers have long warned
that exposing sources has a “chilling effect” on
newsgathering, causing people with important
information to clam up. It’s about time our courts
took this warning seriously.
While there’s no blanket protection for
journalists’ sources—as there is for the information
exchanged between lawyers and their clients—
both rulings recognize the media’s right to claim
privilege, on a case-by-case basis, to protect a
confidential source.
The bad news? To date not one journalist has
been able to convince a court their sources are
worth protecting.
McIntosh and the National Post came close.
In 2004 an Ontario judge ruled the newspaper’s
Shawinigate investigation was a story important
enough to justify protecting the source of a leaked
bank document (possibly faked), which suggested
Chrétien was in a conflict of interest. Justice Mary
Lou Benotto invoked the Charter’s guarantee of
freedom of the press to quash an RCMP search
warrant used to seize the document.
In overturning that ruling in February,
Justice Laskin acknowledged “the gathering and
dissemination of news and information without
undue state interference is an integral component”
of the media’s constitutional rights. But the Charter
does not make journalists “immune from valid
searches” or afford them “an automatic right to
protect the confidentiality of their sources.” A
balance must be struck between “the privacy
interest of the press [and] the state or other societal
interests in getting at the truth.”
The need to identify McIntosh’s source—and
solve what Justice Laskin termed the “grave and
heinous crime” of using a forged document to try
to force a prime minister from office—outweighed
any claim of privilege. The RCMP can seize and
examine the document in search of fingerprints
and traces of DNA.
The Peters case, as it turned out, was as much
about the arcane law of contempt of court as it was
about protecting sources. The issue was how Justice
David Crane dealt with Peters’ refusal to identify
who leaked damning information about conditions
at a nursing home.
The Spectator was ordered to pay more than
$31,000 in costs. The appeal court found the
penalty “excessive” and ruled that citing a reporter
for contempt is a last resort. Peters’ source came
forward on his own, the court noted, so the
contempt finding was a moot point. The message
to judges is clear—journalists trying to protect a
source should be treated with respect, not as if their
goal is to defy the court or subvert justice.
All of this should make journalists think twice
before promising confidentiality to a source. As
Justice Laskin warned, “journalists can never
guarantee confidentiality.”
It’s good practice—not to mention legally and
ethically sound—to warn sources that an iron-clad
promise to protect their identities is impossible.
Journalists can promise to do everything in their
power to protect confidentiality, but if they make
a blanket promise they do so at their peril. Protect
yourself by negotiating an exit strategy, allowing
you and the source to revisit the promise if legal
action is taken to expose the source.
John Miller has defended the National Post
ruling as striking the proper balance between the
rights of journalists and the need to fight crime. “An
RCMP forgery investigation,” he noted in a Globe
and Mail opinion piece reprinted in this issue of
Media on page 24. “was more important than Mr.
McIntosh and the Post protecting the identity of
their anonymous source.”
I’m not so sure. A police investigation can be
a poor way to get to the
bottom of a political
scandal—Think Airbus.
While McIntosh’s
document may yield
some evidence to identify
his source, that will not
expose a forger. There’s
evidence McIntosh’s
source obtained the
The Ken Peters case, as it turned out, was as much about
the arcane law of contempt of court as it was about
protecting sources. The issue was how Justice David Crane
dealt with Peters’ refusal to identify who leaked damning
information about conditions at a nursing home.
document from another, anonymous source and
merely passed it along. One suspects this is really
about chasing a leaker, not fighting crime.
The Post is seeking leave to appeal to the
Supreme Court of Canada, and hopefully the
high court will seize the opportunity to clarify
when journalists can protect sources. As well,
Bloc Québecois MP Serge Ménard has introduced
a private member’s bill to formalize the evolving
common law principles in an American-style shield
law. His proposed amendments to the Canada
Evidence Act—which passed second reading last
fall—would oblige judges to consider alternative
means of obtaining information and the media’s
right to gather news before issuing a search warrant
or demanding testimony that would reveal a
confidential source.
In the meantime, as Miller notes, journalists
should remain wary about making an unconditional
promise to protect a source.
Dean Jobb is an assistant professor of
journalism at the University of King’s College
in Halifax and author of Media Law for Canadian
Journalists, available from Emond Montgomery
Publications http://.emp.ca. l
Fine print
By Dean JoBB
Responsible journalism
It’s a defence that could help warm the libel chill
O
ntario’s Court of Appeal has finally
imported the defence of “responsible
journalism” into Canadian defamation
law, following the lead of courts in Britain,
Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
In last fall’s ruling on a libel award against
the Ottawa Citizen, the appeal court said it
was time to overhaul defamation law to strike
a better balance between the Charter right to
freedom of expression and the need to protect
reputations.
“Debate on matters of public interest will
often be heated and criticism will often carry a
sting and yet open discussion is the lifeblood of
our democracy,” Justice Robert J. Sharpe noted
in the unanimous ruling in Cusson v. Quan (2007
ONCA 771).
But under existing defamation law, he added,
“there is simply no margin for error or allowance
for the expression of views honestly and reasonably
held.” The media’s defences are limited; journalists
must prove facts and allegations are true or fair
comment, or were made in a privileged forum or
document. People can also consent to be libeled, but
subjects of stories rarely incriminate themselves to
the point where this defence is possible.
As a result, there’s “a powerful incentive to err
on the side of caution and to avoid controversy,”
as Justice Sharpe put it, creating “a chilling effect”
on free speech.
“A newspaper that has properly investigated
the story and has every reason to believe it to be
true still walks on thin ice. The fear or risk of being
unable to prove the truth of controversial matters is
bound to discourage the publication of information
the public has a legitimate interest in hearing,” the
judge wrote.
“There is a very real difference between what
a speaker honestly and reasonably believes to be
true and what can be proved to be true in a court
of law. The threat of litigation under a legal regime
that leaves no margin for error, even where the
speaker took all reasonable steps to verify the facts,
discourages free and open debate on matters of
public importance.”
Journalists have been complaining about this
for years, and waiting for the day the responsible
journalism defence pioneered in Britain a halfdozen years ago would reach Canada.
Here’s how the new defence works: if the story
is important enough, and the journalists involved
have done their jobs thoroughly and properly, a
libel action may fail even if the story is wrong.
This is not a defence for the faint of heart or for
reporters who are sloppy or fail to keep an open
mind as they do their stories. A journalist’s actions
and methods will be put under the microscope. So
dust off the ethics handbooks and make sure your
methods conform to your news organization’s code
of conduct.
I’ve always told my students that good
Here’s how the new
defence works: if the
story is important
enough, and the
journalists involved
have done their
jobs thoroughly and
properly, a libel action
may fail even if the
story is wrong.
journalism—stories that are accurate, fair,
balanced and deal with matters of public interest—
offer the best defence to a libel suit. This responsible
journalism defence encompasses all four.
When assessing whether the defence applies,
judges must consider 10 factors that were first
formulated in the British case of Reynolds v.
Times Newspapers Ltd. [2001] 2 A.C. 127.
They are, to quote the Reynolds ruling:
• The seriousness of the allegation. The more
serious the charge, the more the public is
misinformed and the individual harmed, if
the allegation is not true.
• The nature of the information, and the extent
to which the subject-matter is a matter of
public concern.
• The source of the information. Some
informants have no direct knowledge of the
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
events. Some have their own axes to grind, or
are being paid for their stories.
The steps taken to verify the information.
The status of the information. The allegation
may have already been the subject of an
investigation which commands respect.
The urgency of the matter. News is often a
perishable commodity.
Whether comment was sought from the
plaintiff. He may have information others
do not possess or have not disclosed. An
approach to the plaintiff will not always be
necessary.
Whether the article contained the gist of the
plaintiff’s side of the story.
The tone of the article. A newspaper can raise
queries or call for an investigation. It need not
adopt allegations as statements of fact.
The circumstances of the publication,
including the timing.
The British courts have made it clear that
journalists need not satisfy all of these requirements
in order to claim the defence. In 2007 the House
of Lords cleared the Wall Street Journal of libel
even though it did not wait for comment from a
Saudi Arabian businessman accused of funding
terrorism (Jameel v. Wall Street Journal Europe
Sprl, [2007] 1 A.C. 359).
How the defence will play out in this country
remains to be seen. The Citizen established the
precedent but, ironically, lost its bid to overturn
a $100,000 libel award to a policeman accused of
hampering rescue efforts at Ground Zero after
the September 2001 terrorist attacks. Since the
newspaper did not raise the responsible journalism
defence at trial, the Court of Appeal ruled, it could
not use it after the fact.
The Supreme Court of Canada has agreed
to hear the Citizen’s appeal, and the result will
be a ruling that’s binding on judges across the
country.
Will the high court endorse the responsible
journalism defence or will Canada ignore a growing
body of sound, progressive rulings on libel law?
Stay tuned.
Dean Jobb, an assistant professor of journalism
at the University of King’s College in Halifax, is
author of Media Law for Canadian Journalists,
available from Emond Montgomery Publications
(http://www.emp.ca). l
computer-assisted
reporting
By FreD vallance-JoneS
The CBC versus Health Canada
A federal court ruling may embolden government departments to withhold
even more data that’s in the public interest
I
n the 1999 science fiction movie The Matrix,
people live in a simulated world created by
machines to keep the human population docile
while the machines harvest heat and energy from
the people’s bodies.
It made great science fiction, and became a
successful franchise, with two sequels.
Now the matrix is back, and it’s almost as
fantastical as the movies. I’m referring to the “the
matrix effect,” the latest brainchild of Canada’s
relentless privacy advocates, and of government
bureaucrats looking for any way to dodge the
intense scrutiny that has come with the rise of
computer-assisted reporting.
The matrix effect refers to the idea that not only
should the government refuse to release identifying
information about individuals contained in a
database, but it should also withhold anonymous
information that could be merely connected in
some way with other information in the public
domain, to identify someone.
Federal bureaucrats have been advancing the
matrix effect for some time as a basis on which to
scrub anything from databases that could possibly
be connected to an individual in the real world. And
now, they have an important decision from the
Federal Court of Canada to back their contention.
The case at issue is the CBC’s longstanding
battle with Health Canada over the adverse drug
reporting system, or CADRIS. CBC used the data
as the basis for two major investigative series on
drug reactions among the young and seniors. It was
award-winning journalism that shone a bright light
on a dark part of the world of big pharma.
Health Canada had already released many of
the fields in the database, and the decision handed
down February 27 dealt only with the field that
indicated the province of the person who reported
the adverse reaction.
Without getting into the nitty-gritty of the
arguments, Health Canada felt that releasing
the province field greatly increased the chances
that a person whose adverse drug reaction was
recorded in the database could be connected,
by means of some of the details in the database,
with an identified individual in the community. It
argued that this was especially a problem in small
provinces such as Prince Edward Island where
the number of persons who might have suffered a
particular adverse reaction was small.
CBC felt that adding the province field did
not significantly increase the risk of someone
being identified. To back its case, Health Canada
compared adverse reaction reports in the database
with obituaries available on the internet.
“The combination of this information made it
relatively easy to identify personal information if the
province field was known,” said Bill Wilson, head of
the database and terminology at Health Canada, in an
affidavit. A data expert from Statistics Canada backed
Health Canada’s interpretation that by including the
province field, it was far easier to connect data in
the CADRIS tables to identified individuals.
The federal court ruling means that media outlets
such as the CBC can’t use Health Canada’s
adverse drug reaction database to examine what’s
happening in certain provinces.
The court decision is silent on whether Health
Canada was actually able to forge any connections
with the living, but I am pretty certain that if
the department had been able to provide proof,
it would have trumpeted the finding from the
mountaintops.
It is a reflection of the unbalanced nature of
our privacy laws — the privacy of dead people
is protected until they have been buried for 20
years -- that the court accepted Health Canada’s
argument that the dead needed protection from
the prying eyes of reporters. Ironically, the CBC’s
own success in tracking down someone who had
died of a drug reaction, even without the province
field, was used as evidence of the potential invasion
of privacy.
The court can’t really be blamed. The law has
slowly evolved to the point where the prohibition
on releasing information “about an identifiable
individual” has now been interpreted to mean
“information about an individual who could be
identified through diligent detective work.”
It doesn’t matter that the person can’t be
identified on the face of things. If someone could
identify the person by going through libraries of
publicly available information until a match could
be made, even with a dead person, that’s enough
to qualify the information as personal information
as defined by the Privacy Act and interpreted by
the courts.
It’s horrible law, and the implications for access
are clear.
Let’s take the Health Canada-CBC case.
You might think that being able to report on the
deaths of individuals killed by adverse reactions
to prescription drugs would be a good thing. You
might even think the families that lost their loved
ones would support such reporting. It would be in
the public interest and might help prevent future
deaths.
But no matter. Because of the matrix effect,
Canadians are left in the dark about such things.
And while there could be an argument that
protecting the identities of people who died of drug
reactions could be defensible, it’s not hard to see
how this decision will be used.
Departments will hire armies of privacy
consultants to comb through databases requested
under the Access to Information Act to see if any
fields could be connected to publicly-available
information. If any connection can be made,
the court case will be cited as the reason why
anonymous fields should be withheld. Less and
less data will be made public. Canada will retreat
toward the official secrecy that helps senior civil
servants sleep well at night.
And don’t think this will be limited to sensitive
areas such as health care.
Remember that under Canada’s access laws, any
detail about a person, no matter how innocuous,
and no matter what public interest there might be
in making the information available, is a matter of
personal privacy. So, if departments feel there is
any chance anonymous data about anything to do
with individuals can be connected to identifiable
people, living or dead, get ready for demands that
ever more data be deleted prior to release.
It’s almost surreal, a bit like the plot of The
Matrix.
Maybe it’s time for another sequel.
Fred Vallance-Jones is an assistant
professor of journalism at the University of
King’s College in Halifax. You can contact him
at Fvjones@dal.ca. l
Dateline Hong Kong 2008
A Working Fellowship for Canadian Journalists
Application Deadline: September 15, 2008
Hong Kong, Asia’s world city, is a Special Administrative
Region (SAR) of the People’s Republic of China, run by
Hong Kong people under the “One Country, Two Systems”
principle. Hong Kong is one of the most open, externally
oriented economies in the world.
Each application must include a resume, and a written
statement of support from the editor/producer of designed
media organization to publish/broadcast at least three Hong
Kong stories produced by the selected journalist within six
months upon completion of the trip.
With China’s unprecedented economic growth, Hong Kong
has been used as the gateway to the robust Mainland
market. It has also served as the springboard for the
Mainland companies to go overseas. Hong Kong has
been rated the world’s freest economy by the Heritage
Foundation, and Fraser Institute.
The proposal can concentrate on any area of life in Hong
Kong, including but not limited to business, trade, politics,
infrastructure development, IT, tourism, housing, education,
culture and environment, etc.
Working journalists are invited to experience Hong Kong
at first-hand and write or report on various aspects of
the city by applying for the “Dateline Hong Kong
Fellowship 2008” organized by the Hong Kong
Economic & Trade Office in Canada in association with
the Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ).
Selected journalist(s) will be awarded a package which
includes a five-day official visit program, business class air
travel and hotel accommodation. When in Hong Kong,
the journalist(s) will have the opportunity to visit various
points of interest and meet with people of diverse views
and backgrounds.
Neither the Hong Kong SAR nor the CAJ will have any
control over or rights to the work of the participating
journalist(s) and they will enjoy full editorial freedom.
Selection of the successful candidates will be made by CAJ
and announced in early-October. The visit program must be
completed before the end of March 2009.
Application must reach:
The Canadian Association of Journalists
Algonquin College
1385 Woodroffe Avenue, B-224
Ottawa ON K2G 1V8
By Monday, September 15, 2008
For enquiries, please contact
Mr Stephen Siu, Assistant Director (Public Relations) of the
Hong Kong Economic & Trade Office at (416) 924-7374 or
email: stephen_siu@hketotoronto.gov.hk or
John Dickins, Executive Director, CAJ at (613) 526-8061 or
email: canadianjour@magma.ca
Ethics
By STephen J. a. warD
Re-Thinking Media Criticism
Articles about journalistic misbehaviour are important. But they must be
supplemented by other, deeper forms of media analysis
I
n 1859, American journalist Lambert Wilmer
wrote one of the first books on media
criticism in North America. It was entitled,
Our Press Gang or A Complete Exposition of
the Corruptions and Crimes of the American
Newspapers. Wilmer accused the press’s
sensational news provoking violence among the
“rabble.” He decried press subservience to corrupt
“moneyed interests.”
By the late nineteenth century, media criticism
had grown from a trickle of articles to a stream
of books, articles, and speeches decrying the
yellow journalism of powerful press barons. This
criticism signaled a growing discomfort with the
press, and it acted as one of the first forms of media
accountability.
Today, criticism of journalism is as ubiquitous
as the iPod. It is a flourishing industry. Best-selling
books by journalists, academics and others roll
off the printing presses. Media criticism occupies
the attention of many bloggers and occupies large
portions of journalism websites. The news media is
blamed for many things – the decline of democracy,
the misrepresentation of minorities, or the Iraq
War. The critics can be more biased and ideological
than the journalists they attack. They also can be
thoughtful and revealing.
Whatever its qualities, media criticism today is
not as effective as it could be. The problem is not that
we simply need more media criticism. We need to
re-think what media criticism should be, and what
forms it should take. The main fault of current media
criticism is that it tends to be too “individualistic.”
The focus is on today’s media scandal – some
unethical act by individual journalists or newsrooms
on specific stories. Media criticism needs to ‘think
bigger’. It needs to show how specific problems are
related to the economic, social, and political climate
of today’s journalism. And media criticism needs to
“turn positive” and bring forward constructive ideas
for improving journalism.
In short, journalists and concerned citizens
need to create a more effective system for media
discussion and debate. Media criticism needs to be
part of a much larger process of informed public
analysis of journalism and the news media. Yet one
can’t really say how to improve journalism unless
one also has a clear idea of the role of journalism
in society, or Canadian society. Therefore, media
criticism must be based on journalism ethics – on
a clearly defined view of ethical journalism and its
principles. Articles about journalistic misbehaviour
are important. But they must be supplemented by
other, deeper forms of media analysis.
Re-thinking media criticism contains a
conceptual and a practical task. Conceptually,
we need to stop thinking about criticism as
exclusively negative and unproductive -- carping
about journalists, for whatever purpose. Instead,
we should think of criticism as part of a more
constructive activity of analyzing, fairly and
comprehensively, how our news media system
functions to serve democracy, and how journalists
operate within that system. In this manner, media
criticism is embedded in a process of media
accountability. The idea of journalism’s “selfregulation” is widened to include the “public
regulation” of journalism – a joint dialogue among
journalists and the public about how to sustain and
protect quality journalism.
Finally, media criticism should be “informed”
by objective, rigorous, and comprehensive research
into the state of the news media. Canada is slowly
developing journalism research at its schools of
journalism and elsewhere, and such efforts need
to be encouraged and tied to public deliberation
on journalism.
The practical task is to provide mechanisms
for this deliberation. It would require fundamental
change in attitudes among journalists and
members of the public. For instance, journalists
and news organizations would have to be willing
to be open to public scrutiny. Journalists would
need to find a ways to write about crucial decisions
on the news media system, such as CRTC rulings,
that are both understandable to most Canadians
and encourage their participation in the debate.
To re-think media criticism along these lines is to
re-define journalism ethics as involving essential
reference to citizens. Journalism ethics is not
only a concern of professional journalists within
newsrooms.
How could we accomplish all of this? We could
start with a coalition of concerned journalists,
journalism schools, public-interest organizations,
and citizens who create a system for the regular
study, analysis, and discussion of state of the
news media. The coalition could be modeled on
organizations such as the Committee of Concerned
Journalists in the United States. Moreover, the
deliberation should include a range of views and
expertise so that the criticism cannot be dismissed
as the political agenda of certain individuals or
groups. Also, there is need for the development of
objective criteria and methods by which to evaluate
the performance of journalists and their media
system. These criteria, in total, would express
a vision of journalism appropriate to Canada’s
pluralistic society. Once one has a structure for
informed deliberation, and appropriate criteria,
one can proceed to consider specific options for
improving journalism, in line with facts and values.
The latest research into the state of journalism
could be presented at annual, high-profile, public
conferences.
There are many practical questions for this
inclusive process of media criticism to consider.
How can we encourage diversity of media content?
Should we revamp existing mechanisms of
accountability such as press councils? Are there
new ways in which journalists can discuss editorial
issues with citizens and articulate their journalistic
values?
Media criticism will fail to be effective so long
as we think of it as complaining about bad coverage
after the fact, in a piecemeal, story-by-story
approach. We need a broader, structural approach
to discuss and act upon issues of media ethics.
Journalism will be properly “critiqued” only when
citizens have a rigorous process for evaluating their
news media as a whole, and are motivated by a
sincere desire to support quality public journalism.
Without such collective effort, individual books,
articles, and complaints will have limited impact.
I acknowledge that I speak in terms of ideals
and what might be. But how else is one to consider
media criticism and reform? Many journalists
and citizens may not be sufficiently interested
to participate in this public examination of
journalism. However, when one looks around,
one sees many media-related groups that could be
brought together, productively. In the end, if most
people prefer to carp about journalists, rather than
take steps to address problems, then they probably
deserve the journalism they get.
The problem of media criticism and reform is
not a battle between “us” the virtuous “people” and
“them” -- unscrupulous journalists in newsrooms.
There are many working journalists who share the
concerns of the public. They should talk to each
other. They should get to know each other and
break down the stereotypes. It is futile in this age
of interactive media to draw a sharp line between
the public and the “media,” or between journalists
and non-journalists. Canadians don’t just passively
watch media. They increasingly share information,
like journalists. They are immersed in media, as
users and as participants. We are the media.
Therefore we are all, to some degree, responsible
for our journalism. Criticism and reform of news
media begins with us.
Stephen J. A. Ward is director and associate
professor of journalism ethics at the graduate School
of Journalism at the University of British Columbia.
He’s also the author of The Invention of Journalism
Ethics: The Path to Objectivity and Beyond, published
in 2005 by McGill-Queen’s University Press. l
the last Word
By ScoTT Taylor
Pay attention to who’s doing the talking
C
Getting the straight goods on Afghanistan is made harder by the “experts”
who tell us everything’s okay
anadian troops have been in Afghanistan
for more than six years, have suffered
nearly 90 killed and more than 700
wounded, and as a result of media coverage
generated by this controversial mission, the
Canadian military was named newsmaker of the
year in 2006. Despite the constant attention, the
public remains largely ignorant about the core
issues surrounding our objectives in this wartorn country. From the absence of any substantial
domestic political debate concerning Canada’s
foreign policy in Central Asia, it would seem that
our parliamentarians are similarly ill-versed in the
staggering complexities of the Afghan conflict.
Very few real Afghan experts have emerged to
lend their weight to the public discussions, and as
a result, the punditry has been polarized into two
finger-pointing camps: the pro-mission and bringthe-troops-home-now varieties, each claiming that
the other side just “doesn’t get it.”
This does not exactly amount to a fact-based
challenging and compelling exchange of ideas.
Many of those shouting the loudest on the promission side attempt to justify their position
with the fact that they’ve walked the ground in
Kandahar.
The vast majority of the journalists who have
reported on the Canadian contingent in southern
Afghanistan have limited themselves to simply
providing their audience with a worm’s eye view of
soldiering—albeit through the official restrictions
of the Canadian Forces’ embed program. A few
notable exceptions to the straight reporting
have emerged in the form of journalists who are
double-hatted as columnists. Taking their very
narrow perspective of our troops performing a
challenging task in a dangerous little corner of
Afghanistan, they subsequently opine that our
soldiers’ professionalism and sacrifice in itself
justifies the continuance of the mission.
While the Defence Department and Prime
Minister’s Office were certainly thankful for such
media support to help them sell the mission, still
more needed to be done. In addition to their own
legions of commanders and public affairs officers,
the Defence Department felt it was necessary to
create an arm’s-length cadre of spokespersons
who can put forward the same official pro-mission
message to the media, albeit from an independent
pulpit.
To achieve this goal they have created a group
they have dubbed “stakeholders,” which consists
almost entirely of retired senior officers with
friendly ties to the still-serving senior brass. The
title stakeholder is in itself somewhat misleading,
as very few of these ex-officers served in
Afghanistan during their career, none of them are
Afghans, nor do any of them have a commercial or
long-term personal stake in Central Asia.
Therefore, it should be made clear to journalists
who interview these individuals or quote them as
sources, that the stake they hold is in preserving
and promoting the image of the Canadian Forces.
Providing media with material is exactly why these
old generals and colonels were recruited for this
new task.
The Defence Department felt
it was necessary to create
an arm’s-length cadre of
spokespersons who can put
forward the same official
pro-mission message to
the media, albeit from an
independent pulpit.
At regular intervals the stakeholders are flown
into Kandahar Airfield where they are given a
series of briefings and taken on escorted tours.
Although their access is limited to the same
vantage point of the embedded journalists, but
with a briefer exposure, the stakeholders are then
expected to provide expert analysis to media
outlets when they return to Canada.
Although these stakeholders are only
reimbursed for their expenses—and not officially
paid to publicly represent DND’s interests—there
is a grey area in this arrangement. Many of the
stakeholders are drawn from the membership of
the Conference of Defence Associations (CDA).
In an article published in the Globe and Mail
earlier this year by University of Ottawa professor
Amir Attaran ( and re-printed in this edition of
Media magazine on page 23) , it was revealed
that the CDA received an annual $100,000 grant
from DND. In the contract detailing the grant, it
stipulates that in order to receive the payment,
CDA must “support activities that give evidence
of contributing to Canada’s national policies.”
In other words, the CDA is not meant to
encourage debate or give voice to the opposition;
the organization is meant to cheerlead for the
Conservative Party and the Canadian military. In
order to qualify for renewal of the funding, the
DND contract with the CDA obliges the association
to write a number of op-ed pieces for publication
in the mainstream media.
While some may argue that the government
funds a large number of special interest groups,
media outlets should be aware of this mercenary
arrangement before they decide on the value of
using a CDA spokesman as an “independent”
resource.
Even more onerous was the revelation in
Attaran’s column that DND also funds “the
salaries, research, travel and tuition of dozens of
professors, post-doctoral fellows and graduate
students.” He listed 12 Canadian universities
that presently receive grants in excess of half a
million dollars in annual grants through the
Defence Department’s Security and Defence
Forum. Many of these same academics who owe
their livelihood to the military are called upon to
make presentations to parliamentary committees
without disclosing their financial link.
According to Attaran, there is one well-known
Canadian professor and author who received an
$825,000 grant from the DND program. It was
specified that in exchange for that substantive
remuneration, the good professor would “conduct
outreach activities with the Canadian public ... and
Parliament about security and defence issues.”
There is no question that this highly regarded
academic is keeping his side of the bargain.
Mainstream media use him extensively as a
subject matter expert without realizing that he
is being paid handsomely by DND to broadcast
those opinions.
With our troops committed to Afghanistan
through December 2011, it is a safe bet that the
mission in Kandahar will remain a headlinegarnering news story for the foreseeable future.
The debate will continue on Canada’s role, and
it is therefore important that the national press
corps exercises due diligence in understanding
who is funding the arguments they are giving
voice to. Our soldiers are simply following orders
in the belief that they are serving the interest
of the Canadian government. That this same
government, through the Defence Department, is
using duplicitous means to sway public opinion
in favour of the mission is a dishonour to their
sacrifice.
Scott Taylor is an author and Ottawabased journalist who edits Esprit de Corps, a
Canadian military magazine. He also served
in the Armed Forces. l
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Summer 2008 - Canadian Association of Journalists

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