OTTAWA – The rules around the broadcast of false and misleading news will not be broadened, the CRTC confirmed in a decision on Wednesday.
The Commission initially called for comments last January after the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations – a joint Commons and Senate committee that studies government regulations – determined that the CRTC’s rules regarding false and misleading news ran counter to the Charter of Rights.
The proposed amendments led to a public outcry in the media and on-line, resulting in the Commission receiving approximately 3,300 comments with all but 8 criticizing the changes. The CRTC withdrew the public notice in February, and in March, the Committee wrote a letter to the CRTC that it no longer believed that the current regulations ran counter to the Charter of Rights.
The Commission reminded the public that complaints or issues regarding the news content aired by broadcasters should be addressed to the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC), and that it will intervene in the complaint process only if the broadcaster in question is not a member in good standing of the CBSC, or if the complaint has not been satisfactorily resolved by the CBSC.
