By Ahmad Hathout
OTTAWA – The Fox News network is asking the CRTC to reject calls to ban it from Canadian television because doing so is “grossly disproportionate” and inconsistent with the Charter.
The CRTC last month opened a Part 1 process to collect comments on an April request by Egale Canada, an advocacy organization for equality for gays and lesbians, to hold a public consultation to remove the channel to protect LGBTQ people. The offending segment aired on March 28 in which former Fox host Tucker Carlson stated Egale ignored the death of children in a Nashville school shooting and that its untrue that there is a rise in anti-trans violence, citing violence committed by trans people.
But in a submission on Monday, the American cable news network said the request is “grossly disproportionate and unprecedented and would give rise to procedural fairness concerns.”
First, the network said the application should be denied just on the basis that the offending segment that was the sole basis of the application is no longer on the air since the termination of Carlson on April 24.
Second, Fox said the request is unprecedented because it is unlike the other examples of the commission terminating programming from Canadian radio or television.
Last year, the CRTC banned Russia Today from Canadian airwaves over the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine. Fox said in its submission that this has no analogue here because RT is a state-owned network. It also raised the CRTC’s 2004 decision to allow Qatar-owned news network Al Jazeera to operate in the country, despite opposition about some of its coverage that upset some minorities.
Fox also differentiated itself from radio station CHOI-FM. The CRTC renewed the licence for two years in 2002 despite receiving numerous complaints that its spoken word segments were spewing offensive and insulting remarks, including that psychiatric patients be killed in gas chambers and comparing disabled children to animals. The CRTC subsequently denied renewing the licence in 2004 after being warned about its conduct.
Fox said that the radio station, unlike itself, was not intended to open debate about subject matters of public interest and yet the CRTC still renewed the licence – even for a much shorter licence period than normal.
“To FOX News’ knowledge, Egale Canada’s application is the first and only complaint filed with the Commission against FOX News,” Fox said in its submission. “In contrast, the Commission received 47 complaints between 1999 and 2001 about the programming broadcast by CHOI-FM,” adding the offending material was habitual for the station.
In the Carlson case, Fox argued that – despite opening debate on the topic – the offending segment lasted mere seconds and was eventually removed for good.
On the procedural fairness question, Fox said it wasn’t given a warning about what rules it breached or what possible consequences it faced, such as that given to CHOI-FM.
“There is a stark contrast between the lack of notice and lack of evidence before the Commission in the instant proceeding and the voluminous record, prior warnings, specific notice, and progressive enforcement measures implemented by the Commission before engaging delisting procedures in the CHOI-FM case,” Fox said. “Given this contrast, moving in the instant case to the extreme remedy requested by Egale Canada would give rise to procedural fairness concerns.”
Fox also said the application is contrary to the Charter’s values of freedom of expression. It added the ban would cause friction with the implementation of the Online Streaming Act, which “requires the Commission to exercise its authority in a manner consistent with “ensur[ing] freedom of expression and journalistic independence.”
The Forum for Research and Policy in Communications said while it shares Egale’s concerns about such offending programming, the specific instance may not reach the threshold required to ban the channel.
“A risk exists that if the CRTC prohibits the carriage of the FOX News service because of a segment within a program, the Commission could be accused of arbitrariness in decision-making, especially given the express protection that Parliament has given to freedom of expression in the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Broadcasting Act,” the FRPC said.
The FRPC said the CRTC could address the application via other means, including requiring lawful content as a condition to allow non-Canadian programming, require these programs to keep recordings of content for at least eight months for complaint review, have the carrying broadcasters develop a code of conduct for carriage, and encourage the broadcasters to create a non-governmental body to address complaints about non-Canadian programming.
The CRTC has so far received thousands of submissions in the proceeding. A chunk of the submissions support the ban application, claiming Fox broadcasts other hateful content that is not exclusive to the March 28 segment, allegedly including transphobic, homophobic and racist content.
