Google closer to wiping Canadian news from its search engine as Ottawa online news law worsens
Google says the draft plan to implement Ottawa’s fraught online news law worsens rather than calms its concerns about the legislation, as the clock ticks on the global web giant’s threat to wipe Canadian news from its search engine.
“Unfortunately, while well intended, the act is built upon a fundamentally flawed premise yielding an unworkable framework and process that the regulations unfortunately do not remedy — and in certain instances, exacerbate,” the company’s submission to the federal government reads.
The submission, which was made public Friday, outlines Google’s latest qualms with the Online News Act, which passed earlier this year. The contentious law will compel platforms like Google and Facebook owner Meta to enter into deals with Canadian media publishers for sharing and previewing online news content. The Liberal government says the law will end tech titans’ dominance of the digital advertising market, something Ottawa argues is siphoning revenues away from Canada’s shrinking journalism industry.
Both Google and Meta oppose the legislation, arguing it unfairly forces them into vaguely defined payment deals for driving traffic and generating revenue for news outlets at no cost.
Meta began blocking news for Facebook and Instagram users in Canada this summer, indicating the move could be permanent. The company has rebuffed the regulatory process and believes its concerns can no longer be addressed.
Ottawa is currently reviewing the submissions it received in response to its draft regulations, which, when finalized, will decide how the law will actually work in practice.
Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge’s office told the Star the government does not want to release its final guidelines until everyone is on board with the regulations.
But with Google now suggesting the regulatory process is hopeless and that legislative changes might be the only path forward, the two parties could be on a collision course toward an outcome that could deal a serious blow to Canadians’ access to news.
Google has signalled that if its issues are not met, it will remove all Canadian news content from its search engine on or shortly after Dec. 19, the date the Online News Act comes into effect.
The government’s draft regulations proposed a formula that would determine how much cash the platforms would have to pony up to news publishers. Under that formula, which was intended to provide tech platforms with clarity over how much they’d be expected to pay, Google would contribute around $172 million a year to Facebook’s $62 million.
In a background briefing with media on Friday, Google took issue with the details of that formula, arguing it should not have to contribute a minimum of four per cent of its estimated Canadian revenue, given that the money it derives from linking to news is just a fraction of a percentage of its overall revenue.
Google also takes issue with the mandatory bargaining model set out in the law, which allows one party to launch a final-offer arbitration process if a deal is not reached, and for smaller outlets to band together to come to agreements of their own.
The company says that Ottawa’s proposed bargaining arrangement combines two types of models that will ultimately require “Google to absorb all of the responsibilities and costs associated with negotiating agreements and disbursing funds, while eliminating any flexibility in actual arrangements.”
The result offers Google “the worst of both worlds,” its submission to the government notes.
“Canadians expect tech giants to pay their fair share for news. We will be reviewing all submissions we have received. We will continue to engage those with questions or concerns, including tech giants. We remain focused on creating commercial, fair agreements between tech giants and newsrooms,” the heritage minister said in a statement Friday.
The company says it’s increasingly seeing the need for a legislative approach to usher in its desired changes, which could be achieved by including amendments to the law in an omnibus bill or included in the coming fall economic statement.
Google said Friday it had hoped the government would interpret the regulations in its favour, but because that didn’t happen, it’s incumbent on Ottawa to tweak the legislation as quickly as possible before the law comes into force.
“Given that this act is not yet in force, we are focused on the regulatory process at this time. We remain focused on addressing concerns and questions through the regulatory process that has yet to be concluded,” St-Onge said in response.
This article was reported by The Star
