A new “Fitzgibbon affair” is stirring up passions in the news.
The powerful Minister of Economy, Innovation and Energy, who is also responsible for regional economic development as well as for the Metropolis and the Montreal region, does not like the questions put to him by a journalist.
Mr Fitzgibbon posted a message on his Facebook account denouncing the questions he did not like.
Since then, the editor of Montreal Journal, Dany Doucet, signed a ticket to defend his journalist. The Professional Federation of Journalists of Quebec went out to denounce Minister Fitzgibbon’s attacks. The assistant editor of The Press, François Cardinal, has published a text which returns to this affair. And the columnist and former mayor of Gatineau, Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin, wrote a post about it on December 22 in The Press.
The question is not whether Pierre Fitzgibbon has the right, or not, to criticize the media. Of course he has the right to do so. It’s even healthy that he does.
The media are not perfect. And it is important that we can criticize them. And journalists too are not immune to criticism. Whether they like it or not, it’s part of the democratic game.
But what is it about here? Before continuing, let’s take the time to re-read the famous questions asked of Pierre Fitzgibbon:
— Does the Minister believe that his announced donation of $5 million to HEC Montréal is sending the wrong message to other universities?
“Why didn’t you wait until after his mandate as minister to announce it?”
“Can he grant me an interview on this?”
Now back to Mr. Fitzgibbon’s social media post…
— “Yet even a personal and disinterested donation generates ill-intentioned interest on the part of a journalist in bad faith. »
— “Too often, Quebecers do not see the aggressiveness and bad faith of these questions on a daily basis, often asked by the same press group. »
— “Commanded missions have too often taken precedence over serious and rigorous journalism. »
To say that the minister did not like the questions is an understatement. He has the right. However, there is no aggressiveness in the questions, on the contrary. They are very factual.
Bad faith? It is difficult to draw such a conclusion from reading these questions. Is it the opposite of serious and rigorous journalism?
These are legitimate questions. Is the minister’s donation to HEC Montréal the scandal of the century? Of course not. But we are talking about a minister who has made his sixth investigation by the Ethics Commissioner of the National Assembly.
It is normal for the media to be interested in the actions of this minister who, I repeat, is one of the most important in the Council of Ministers.
For the Professional Federation of Journalists of Quebec, the problem is not that Mr. Fitzgibbon published the journalist’s questions. Again, he can do it, no rule prevents him from doing so. The problem is the accusations and the tone of his message.
He accuses the journalist of bad faith. His questions would be aggressive. He does not do serious and rigorous journalism, according to him.
One regularly hears criticisms that journalists are complacent towards politicians. At the height of the pandemic, a segment of the population also accused the media of not asking the real questions of the elected officials of the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ).
The media, which are now entitled to public subsidies, receive their instructions from the government, we read on occasion. And yet, journalists and the media continue to do their job, no matter what. I repeat: journalists and the media are not perfect. And the right of reply exists.
Minister Fitzgibbon could very well have taken advantage of it. Rather than attacking the journalist with a tactic worthy of garage leagues, he could have presented his point of view in a thoughtful and calm way. What he didn’t do. It is his right.
But the worst part of all this is that the journalist did not publish a text on this case. As it happens regularly. We ask questions, but there is not always a report that follows.
An assessment is made afterwards to determine whether the subject merits coverage or not. Here, there was not even a text following the questions – and answers – about Pierre Fitzgibbon’s donation to HEC Montréal.
It was the minister himself, in a way, who created this new “Fitzgibbon affair” by publishing the journalist’s questions which he did not like. Without it, no one would have talked about it.
Journalists will therefore continue to ask questions. But it’s not the questions that are important, it’s the answers. It’s our job to inform the public, to ask tons of questions, sometimes difficult ones.
In this case, the journalist and his media ultimately judged that the answers were not worth writing about. Perhaps Minister Fitzgibbon should have done the same on his side…