World Press Freedom Day: May 3, 2024

Remarks by former CBC anchor Heather Bakken:

Section 2(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects freedom of the press. That’s because Press Freedom ensures citizens can be informed, empowered, and able to participate in the democratic process.

But are they informed?

On May 3 the latest edition of the World Press Freedom Index will be released by Reporters Without Borders. It evaluates the environment for journalism in 180 countries and we can expect geopolitical turmoil to have a bearing on the results.

Last year’s index showed the environment for journalism was bad in 70% of those countriesmeasured. The rest were merely ‘Satisfactory.’

Not coincidentally, global freedom declined for the 17th consecutive year.

As press freedom goes, so goes democracy.

2024 is a pivotal year for Democracy.

More than half of the world’s population heads to the polls in 64 countries plus the European Union.But the Secretary General for Reporters Without Borders has warned the World Press Freedom Index is showing enormous volatility; the instability aresult of fewer working journalists and a growing animosity towards them — and the consequence ofmassive disinformation and propaganda campaigns, which are now fuelled by Artificial Intelligence.

AI has given bad actors an unprecedented ability to tamper with content that is being used to undermine those who embody responsible journalism — and it weakens journalism itself. Weakened journalism denies citizens the oversight function that keeps governments accountable.

Nobody knows that better than the US Guardian columnist, Margaret Sullivan, this year’s keynote speaker for World Press Freedom Canada’s annual awards luncheon.

As Sullivan noted in her book, Ghosting the News, until recently in Brampton Ontario, there was no local radio station, no local TV station, no daily newspaper, and no serious online news outlets. This is known as news poverty or a news desert.

Our 2022 Press Freedom Award winner, Fatima Syed, worked for a tiny non-profit online magazine in Toronto and went into this community of immigrants and essential workers because the COVID-19 test positivity rate was more than double that of the rest of the province. Through her enterprise reporting in this news desert, she discovered the health system had failed the people who needed help the most. Syed’s journalism was picked up by the major dailies and, in short order,the province sent an abundance of resources to remedy the wrongs.

They say all politics is local; well, all news is local too.

To quote from Margaret’s book, “the core of investigative work is something of public importance that someone doesn’t want you to know.”

A free press is essential for the functioning of democracy by informing the public, serving as a watchdog, facilitating public discourse, giving voice to minorities, and seeking transparency and accountability wherever it is needed.

But today there are news deserts from one end of the country to the other.

Within the last year the CBC announced 600 job cuts.

Metroland Media Group, one of country’s largest news publishers, filed for bankruptcy protection. 650 people were laid off and its weekly community newspapers were shuttered across Ontario.

CTV cut roughly 100 jobs and sold 45 regional radio stations.

TVA Group cut 547 jobs – 31% of its workforce.

Global news was gutted during the pandemic.

This is not good for democracy.

Those who don’t want to be held to account obfuscate the truth and 

pollute our information ecosystem with false promises and false flags.

As authoritarianism stakes its ground with frightening intensity, we must remind people that journalists are our watchdogs, not our lapdogs.

Support them and you support a free press.

We wish our European friends fair elections next month for European Parliament.

And… we wait with bated breath for November.