Radio-Canada, the French-language arm of the CBC, will test the federal Journalistic Sources Protection Act before the country’s highest court. The Supreme Court of Canada (SCOC) has announced it will hear an appeal filed by Radio-Canada after investigative reporter Marie-Maude Denis was compelled to reveal anonymous sources in a Quebec Superior Court decision last March. The case stems from the political financing for public contracts trial of former Quebec cabinet minister and Roche VP Marc-Yvan Côté. A series of Mar. 2016 arrests by Quebec’s Unité permanente anticorruption (UPAC), followed the broadcast of two documentaries on the investigative program Enquête, that exposed ties between Quebec Liberal Party fundraising and the awarding of public contracts. Read the full story here.
VOIS Inc., the Calgary-based IPTV service provider, has been fined $25,000 for failing to participate in the Commission for Complaints for Telecom-television Services (CCTS), in violation of the Telecommunications Act. The company was previously fined $15,000 in 2016. According to an Aug. 9 CRTC notice, the commission has not received response from VOIS or its director Harpreet Randhawa, who have until Sept. 10 to pay the fines. VOIS offers South Asian programming in Hindi, Punjabi, Bengali, Urdu and Gujurati, among other languages.
Michael Geist, University of Ottawa law professor and Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law, has obtained more documents under access-to-information that indicate Bell lobbied post-secondary institutions to support the FairPlay Canada website-blocking coalition. Geist has published documents on his blog showing TSN senior VP Mark Milliere lobbied Charles Falzon, dean of Ryerson University’s Faculty of Communication and Design (FCAD), to support FairPlay. The coalition, comprised of roughly 25 media companies, wants the CRTC to establish an Independent Piracy Review Agency that would review and block websites engaged in content theft without a court order.
Journalists for Human Rights (JHR) has opened the 2018 call for nominations for its annual Achievement In Human Rights Reporting Award. The Toronto-based non-profit is accepting nominations from around the world this year from journalists who have made a significant contribution to human rights journalism. Last year, the award went to the Toronto Star’s Sara Mojtehedzadeh for her reportage on workers’ rights in Ontario, which led to legislative changes and stronger oversight of laws governing the rights of temporary workers. Nominations are due Sept. 10. Find the form here
The Canadian Music Therapy Trust Fund has announced the creation of the George Stroumboulopoulos Scholarship, supported by the media personality and host of CBC Music’s The Strombo Show. The scholarship will be offered to Canadian music therapy students to help them complete their studies and internship hours. Applications open this September.
James Cridland will return to the Ontario Association of Broadcasters (OAB) annual conference in Toronto on Nov. 8. The “radio futurologist’s” keynote “How Can We Safeguard the Future of Radio?” will explore changing listener expectations. Registration is now open.
