Broadcasters air lies about Thomas Mulcair because the CRTC allows it

    1 of 1 2 of 1

      Whenever I turn on CKNW Radio or News 1130, I seem to hear a vicious Conservative attack ad about NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair's "carbon tax".

      Nothing gets me flipping the dial more quickly than this message.

      That's because the ad is a bald-faced lie and any station that airs it does not deserve my time.

      Mulcair has never supported a carbon tax, much to the chagrin of some environmentalists. It's not just me saying that he opposes a carbon tax. Maclean's columnist Paul Wells has also pointed out that the Conservatives are lying when they say Mulcair backs a carbon tax.

      But the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council, which is a private-sector-run subcontractor to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, does nothing to stop these lies from repeatedly going out over the airwaves.

      And that's undermining Canadian democracy.

      Another self-regulatory body, Advertising Standards Canada, also hasn't done anything about the carbon-tax message, even though its code says that ads "must not contain inaccurate, deceptive or otherwise misleading claims".

      I've previously reported that the Canadian Association of Broadcasters asked the federal broadcast regulator for the right to govern broadcast standards in 1986.

      Five years later, the CRTC granted this wish.

      So now when a private radio station airs a bald-faced lie—such as the one about Mulcair promoting a carbon tax—the public is encouraged to go to the industry-funded organzation. The very companies that make whopping sums of money from these outrageously false ads are, in effect, the referees.

      That's a conflict of interest. A regulator should never be in a position to profit from its decisions.

      If the NDP wants to scare the daylights out of the private-sector broadcasters that keep running these lies, there's a simple solution: promise to return the regulation of broadcast standards to the CRTC.


      Follow Charlie Smith on Twitter at twitter.com/csmithstraight.

      Comments

      30 Comments

      DavidH

      Nov 18, 2012 at 11:55am

      I don't generally support Conservative policies or values, but it's their bald-faced, ignorant lies that turn me off (completely) from voting Conservative.

      Only an ignorant moron would vote for a party that tells bald-faced lies, day after day.

      Lie to me and I will do everything in my power to fu*k you around. I'm not as stupid and uninformed as a member of the Conservative base.

      PS - CKNW is the most ridiculous radio station in Canada. They don't employ a single host with a functioning brain. That's why we now have Christy Clark as premier - stupid, biased and useless.

      Maybe former sports reporter, Bill Good, will assume the leadership.

      Mateus Rocha

      Nov 18, 2012 at 1:00pm

      Nothing says that you can't appreciate a good piece of propaganda, so why don't you write your own?

      WinkDinkerson

      Nov 18, 2012 at 1:04pm

      The Cons are just taking a page out of the old Joesph Goebbels playbook: "Tell a lie often enough and people will believe it".
      Yes, the Cons have resorted to the strategy of a Nazi propaganda artist to win public support and please their corporate masters. Nothing new here, actually...

      independent my ass

      Nov 18, 2012 at 1:33pm

      The conservatives hijacked the CRTC over a year ago. Calling it an 'independent' body now is a joke. Expect a lot more of this to come.

      Justin Flontek

      Nov 18, 2012 at 2:02pm

      Cons lie. Only way they're going to learn not to lie, is to smack them around every time they get caught.

      Ivan Ilyich

      Nov 18, 2012 at 2:34pm

      I've heard these dumbo attack ads "brought to you by Canada's conservatives" on Radio 103.5 Vancouver.

      They run another ad for the BC Liberals which only a person who has no knowledge of their disgraceful behaviour could fall for. "We're on our way to balancing the budget in 2015". I can't forget how they were wrong on the budget by around 900% before the last election and yet no mention of HST.

      They don't seem to have any other advertising which makes me think I'm listening to pure government sponsored propaganda. I would turn it off but I'm not at home.

      Is the CRTC complicit to allow these fables on air?

      “The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly - it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over”

      Joseph Goebbels
      Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda

      Birdy

      Nov 18, 2012 at 3:10pm

      Look, Harper displeases me as much as anyone, but the NDP want a cap-and-trade system to "force polluters to pay for their carbon output."

      How is that not a tax? Specifically, a carbon tax?

      Taking money by force is taxation, you can call it cap-and-trade, or call it a handjob, or call it gaia stimulus, but that doesn't change the fact that it's a tax.

      TaivoE

      Nov 18, 2012 at 3:48pm

      Charlie Smith, you are the greatest Vancouver journalist and I thank God for your existence every time I read an article written by you. Yes, the deck is getting stacked against us more, but without you most people wouldn't even know it.

      Keep your stick on the ice and your elbows up in the corner, we're in the stands rooting for you!

      DavidH

      Nov 18, 2012 at 3:49pm

      @ Birdy: The Conservatives have also advocated cap-and-trade.

      Please tell the class how this differs from the NDP cap-and-trade.

      If you can't do so, logically, here's an idea: Shut up.

      blablabla

      Nov 18, 2012 at 5:14pm

      Give us a break Charlie, just because you hate the Conservatives, it doesn't mean the Straight is the only source for the truth & the same for other "alternative" media outlets. Just face it, people who read, listen or watch mainstream media/news outlets are not stupid like you would like to think we are nor are we being duped or lied too. But then again we aren't informed & aware as a leftest purest such as yourself.