Justin Trudeau acts like a spoiled child when events or individuals stand in his way. He calls those who disagree with him names, for example, participants at the Freedom Convoy and the 1 Million March 4 Children. Former Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould, Finance Minister Bill Morneau, and former Liberal MP Celina Caesar-Chavannes are examples. Collateral damage can be the fate of those who do follow his dictates, such as Secretary of the Privy Council Michael Wernick, Trudeau’s friend and former Chief of Staff Gerald Butts, and former Governor General David Johnston. They all have been damaged by their involvement with Trudeau.
Trudeau Wants Control
Trudeau has controlled the print media by paying them off with his annual grant of $350 million. He also has laid the ground work to control the internet with Bill C-11, the Online Streaming Act, passed in April 2023. The internet is described by Trudeau as being full of “misinformation and disinformation” which cannot continue unregulated.
Trudeau’s will to control the internet and the entire broadcast system encountered great difficulties because it raised so many concerns. Even the Trudeau appointed Senate was reluctant to adopt the bill. The Senate returned the bill to the House of Commons with 26 proposed amendments. The bill was then sent back to the Senate for final approval with some of the amendments but not all. The Senate only reluctantly allowed the bill to pass, on the basis that the final decision had been made by the elected House of Commons. In fact the bill reflected only the will of Trudeau and his co-Prime Minister, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh. Their MPs do what they are told and, under our current system, do not represent the concerns of their constituents when voting.
What is Bill C-11, the Online Streaming Act?
This bill provides that the Trudeau appointed members of the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) will control all streaming giants, podcasting platforms, porn sites, online news services, and social media platforms that operate in Canada to ensure not only Canadian content, but also to reflect the “diversity” of Canadians.
The CRTC announced on September 29, 2023, under powers provided in Bill C-11, that the broadcasters are required to register with the CRTC by November 2023, so that it can create a database to regulate podcasts and just about everything else. In June 2023 the CRTC received direction from the Heritage Department that programming in Canada must reflect the circumstances and aspirations of Canadians including equal rights, linguistic duality, the multicultural and multiracial nature of Canadian society, and the special place of the Indigenous people in society. In effect the CRTC has been directed to ensure that programming in Canada provides opportunities for Indigenous people, black and other racialized people, and LGBTQ to express their views.
This policy applies to any broadcasting platform earning $10 million dollars annually. Although much programming, such as podcasts, doesn’t have such large budgets, the platforms that they use to distribute their programs such as Apple, Spotify, and You Tube do. Whatever is demanded of the platforms will be demanded of its clients. In other words, this may not be direct censorship of podcasts, etc., but the impact of the legislation is the government regulating all of the internet.
The fact is that there was little wrong with internet streaming. If nothing else, it was highly diverse. Nobody else has asked for control of the internet, which will result in Canada having the most heavily regulated internet in the world. Elon Musk (of Twitter, now called X) declared, “Trudeau is trying to crush free speech in Canada”. Others, such as American investigative reporter, Glenn Greenwald, stated on his streaming platform that the act is one of the world’s “most repressive online censorship schemes!”