Justin Trudeau swept aside a far-fetched resolution adopted Saturday at the Liberal convention which called for the establishment of a policy to force journalists to reveal their sources in the name of the fight against misinformation.
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This is a policy “that we would not put [pas] implemented,” said the Prime Minister on Tuesday morning.
“We will never do that – we will never undermine the ability of journalists to do the independent professional work that they do,” he continued.
The resolution called on the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC) to “explore options” to force newspapers to stop using unidentified sources in their reporting.
However, recourse to this type of information is common and often essential to the free flow of information, given the risks to which certain individuals expose themselves when they speak, as recalled, among others, the Conservative Party and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association.
Mr. Trudeau took the opportunity to fire red balls at Meta, parent company of Facebook and Instagram, which assured Monday that it would block journalistic content from its platforms if the government went ahead with its Bill C-18 .
“Rigorous, thought-provoking and independent journalism is essential, and the fact that Facebook continues to say it doesn’t want to pay journalists for the work they do shows how deeply irresponsible and out of touch they are with the way we have to make sure that we protect all of our democracies,” said the Prime Minister.
Meta’s line of argument that journalistic content has no economic value to business is “not only wrong, it’s dangerous to our democracy and our economy,” he said.
The journalists who worked on the revelations that led to the Watergate scandal “were not influencers, you know?” Quipped Mr. Trudeau.