Online News Act

Bill C-18 – the Online News Act officially takes effect

The federal government has announced the rules and regulations for the Online News Act, which officially came into effect on Dec. 19. Photo by Alexandre Tétreault. Provided by Ariane Joazard-Bélizaire.

By Taylor McClure
Townships’ Daily News Bits
CIDI 99.1 FM
Published on 21/12/23 - Played on 21/12/23

The federal government has announced rules and regulations for Bill C-18, The Online News Act. 

The Minister of Canadian Heritage Pascale St-Onge (who is also the MP for Brome-Missisquoi) joins CIDI to talk about next steps.

The Online News Act came into effect on Dec. 19, which requires large search engines and social media companies (specifically Google and Meta) to invest in Canada’s news sector through a new bargaining framework.

With newsrooms closing across the country, the goal of the Online News Act is for news organizations to be compensated for the content that tech companies benefit from, Minister St-Onge told CIDI.

She explained that the news content that is found on the search engines and social media platforms attract advertising revenue for these companies — revenues that “used to pay for journalists in newsrooms in the past” — and that Canada’s media organizations have “never been compensated for this news content.”