(Ottawa) “Oh, Jesus.” CBC/Radio-Canada boss Catherine Tait couldn’t contain her exasperation in committee after she was accused of lying by Conservative MP Rachael Thomas on Thursday morning.
Posted at 10:49 am.
As indicated at the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage meeting, where the elected Conservative accused CBC of siding with Hamas, the statement from the state-owned company’s president and CEO was hostile.
Representative Rachael Thomas did not explicitly repeat these comments – but her colleague Melissa Lantsman, with whom she shared speaking time, accused the channel of “helping Hamas” by asking its journalists to use the word “terrorist” to describe Hamas -To avoid militiamen.
But in a tense exchange in which she demanded an apology from Catherine Tait for choosing a title by initially attributing the Gaza hospital strike to Israel, the Alberta elected representative went so far as to accuse her of doing so to have lied to the committee.
“Ms Tait seems to enjoy setting the record straight here, but unfortunately she is not paying attention to setting the record straight for the benefit of the Canadian public […] “She said trust was paramount, but telling the truth was clearly not part of her definition of trustworthiness,” she said.
The “Oh Jesus” from his interlocutor followed, and the liberal Taleeb Noormohamed intervened.
“Just to be clear, I believe Ms. Thomas accused the witness of lying? I just want to make sure that doesn’t happen,” he confirmed.
The MP objected, prompting New Democrat Peter Julian to call for a retraction of these “incredibly unparliamentary” and “inappropriate” comments in a committee that is not “a side fight”.
“It obviously wasn’t my intention, but obviously the censorship coalition is going to try to silence me,” Rep. Thomas argued.
A short time later, she returned to the allegation, saying she was “curious” to understand why CBC/Radio-Canada could boast of being independent of the government, since the crown corporation would do so without its $1.4 billion in annual funding -Dollars do not survive, which “comes 100% from the state.”
“To be clear, funding does not come 100% from government,” noted Catherine Tait. Our budget is 1.8 billion. The rest, another 400 million, comes from advertising revenue and subscriptions. »
“Wrong title”
The tone was set from the first minutes of this performance, which lasted just over an hour.
“On October 17, CBC published a false headline that falsely attributed responsibility for the Gaza explosion to Israel, based on dangerous misinformation,” criticized MP Melissa Lanstman, who is also deputy leader of the Conservative Party.
Catherine Tait began by emphasizing that the text was based on information from the Associated Press agency, a “reliable source” cited in the article, and explained that they were up to date 90 minutes later, when the corrected information was received Network.
And she flatly refused to apologize as the MP demanded.
“I will not apologize because our journalism is among the best in the world,” Ms Tait said.
Danger of political interference
Right from the start, she expressed concern about attempts at political interference in her brief opening statement.
“I fear that some may want to use the power of a parliamentary committee to put pressure on our staff who are responsible for our day-to-day journalism,” she argued.
Conservative MPs who sit on the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage have tried more than once to summon Crown corporation executives to hear them discuss coverage of the war between Israel and Hamas.
The elected representatives of the other parties, who together are in the majority, blocked the adoption of corresponding proposals.