Most Canadians oppose government funding newsrooms, media consolidation: Angus Reid survey
CTV
A recent survey finds most Canadians oppose having government fund newsrooms over concerns of journalistic independence.
A recent survey finds most Canadians oppose having government fund newsrooms over concerns of journalistic independence.
The results from the Angus Reid Institute, released on Thursday, found that a majority of Canadians also oppose the consolidation of the news media in Canada, in order to encourage greater competition.
In all, 59 per cent of Canadians surveyed do not believe that the government should fund newsrooms, 19 per cent say it should and 22 per cent are unsure.
Conservative voters are more likely to say the government should not fund newsrooms at 83 per cent compared to a plurality of past Liberal and NDP voters at 48 and 38 per cent, respectively.
The survey comes as Google and Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, threaten to block news links from their platforms over the federal government's Online News Act, which would force those companies to negotiate compensation deals with media outlets.
A previous Angus Reid survey found that while 61 per cent of Canadians agree that tech companies should compensate news organizations for their content, 49 per cent also believe that the federal government should "back down."
"However, there is no stop to the seismic shift to the media consumption landscape happening under newsrooms' feet," the latest report from Angus Reid reads.
