(Ottawa) A new battle is being played out before the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) over the first annual payment of $100 million that Google agreed to make to Canadian media outlets as part of the Online News Act.
The Canadian Journalists Collective, the group tasked by Google with distributing money to media outlets, has submitted its plans for its governance structure to the CRTC.
If the regulator is satisfied with these, it will grant Google an exemption from the Online News Actwhich requires tech companies to strike deals with news publishers.
The exemption will then trigger payments to the media.
Some media outlets, however, claim that the plan presented is incomplete and fear that its revision will delay payment.
Instead, they argued to the CRTC in written submissions that they wanted Google to disburse the funds through an accounting firm while the permanent plan was fleshed out.
“The alternative – to reject Google’s request outright – risks putting us back where we started,” Corus Entertainment said in its submission. Corus is the parent company of Global News, which laid off 35 journalists in June. It said the media could no longer wait for the money.
The Canadian Association of Broadcasters has called for the funds to be “disbursed to qualified recipients as soon as possible,” or “at a minimum,” for the first round of funds to be distributed by the end of the year.
News Media Canada, which represents hundreds of publishers, said there was a lack of “critical information” about the Canadian Journalism Collective, including its governance and how it will calculate payments and distribute funds.
Google has said it is willing to make an initial payment of $250,000 to help set up the organization that will disburse the funds, but the tech giant maintains it should not have to start making payments to media outlets until it receives a full exemption from the Online News Act.
The exemption will also allow Google to comply with the law by paying dues to a single collective bargaining group that will serve as a media fund.