The Scotiabank Herald: The Horror?
October 10th, 2009
It’s a spectre that should, by rights, send a chill down the spine of every red-blooded journalist - and citizen, for that matter.
Control of Canada’s leading daily newspapers, titles like the Ottawa Citizen, Vancouver Province, Calgary Herald and Montreal Gazette, has reportedly fallen into the hands of … a bank.
Yes, a bank, Scotiabank by name, formerly the Bank of Nova Scotia, trailed by a clutch of creditors of the crumbling Canwest Global media empire.
So is it curtains? The end of giving our fedoras a rakish tilt and murmuring “Honey, get me rewrite” down the phone line? What will it be now for the staffers of Canwest’s print newsrooms across the country? Clicking a mouse on “Powerchequing”, then linking to “Gain Plan” with “Paperless Recordkeeping” and the “Private Client Group?”
And what about the people of Canada, the citizens whose last, best defence against untrustworthy government, unscrupulous tycoons - and yes, banks - is the fourth estate, a free press? In this context, Canwest’s collapse constitutes one of the gravest threats to our country’s political culture since big-dollar patronage placed a chokehold on our ruling party machines.
But to the men and women who’ve toiled loyally for Canwest, and for the legion of retirees and ‘rightsized’ former employees who rely on the group’s pensions, a much more basic set of threats looms up from the ashes of the House of Asper.
Read More...Canwest Witnesses Go Under Oath
September 9th, 2009
Pursuing the managements of giant media conglomerates through the courts is a costly, time-consuming venture.
But eventually the long, steady climb up the slopes of procedure and the crags of delay ushers the parties onto the sunny plateau known as examinations for discovery. At last it’s time to look at the facts of the case in the full light of day.
Witnesses are sworn in and questions are put to them by opposing counsel. A court reporter notes every word for the record.
On July 14th, examinations for discovery began in Kent vs. Don Martin, Canwest Publishing, the National Post, the Calgary Herald and related companies.
I brought this lawsuit last year in response to the attack article published Feb. 12, 2008 on the nationalpost.com website and the following day in the print editions of the National Post and the Calgary Herald (please see The Page At Issue pdf at the top right of our homepage) and because both the Post and Herald refused to publish my response.
Read More...Awakening To Alberta’s Lost Advantage
March 3rd, 2009
One year ago, we Albertans set a new record. Ominously, it had nothing to do with our province’s economic growth, which we had come to take for granted. This benchmark was about who we are as citizens, and how we see ourselves within our communities, our culture and our economy.
Last March 3rd, only 40.6% of eligible voters cast ballots in the Alberta general election, Canada’s lowest-ever turnout for a provincial vote. Ed Stelmach’s Progressive Conservatives won an increased majority, but the victory was warped by indifference: only 23% of the electorate had voted PC.
This was embarrassing, to be sure, but few Albertans expected grave economic consequences. Many followed the lead of Premier Stelmach and his cabinet, shrugging off the gloomy statistics as evidence that Albertans are resigned to one-party dominance.
But this year, the headlines aren’t as easy to shrug off. It turns out more than just some vague notion of civic duty was on the line last year. Our families’ jobs, our solvency - our entire economy was at stake.
Read More...Canwest’s Only Hope: Core Values
November 17th, 2008
Today we complete our current series, which began October 20th with Challenging Defamation and Political Vandalism. New visitors to the site might find that browsing through our entries in sequence from that starting point is the best way to get up to date.
Pausing for a while provides an opportunity to reflect on the broader background issues to the case we’re pursuing, among them the crises of mounting debt and plummeting share value besetting the Canwest Global Corporation and its related firms.
We need to bear in mind that the livelihoods of thousands of colleagues depend on their bosses pulling the Canwest empire back from the brink. These diverse companies are some of North America’s largest employers of news professionals and media workers.
Last week’s news that the conglomerate is cutting its workforce by 560 positions, or five percent, alarms all of us who have contributed, at one time or another, to the publications and programs that will now be forced to do more with less.
Read More...Hypocrisy Rolls Off Canwest’s Tongue
November 14th, 2008
Hypocrisy isn’t pretty, but the trait is never less appealing than when it comes from the mouth of a media goliath caught misleading its readers.
Yesterday, when asked by the Canadian Press about his company facing a libel action before New York’s State Supreme Court, Canwest Global vice-president of public affairs John Douglas “wouldn’t comment on the lawsuit, saying the matter is now before the courts.”
Commendable, it would seem – until we remember that our election, in Canada’s province of Alberta earlier this year, was also governed by strict judicial rules, and yet Canwest’s most powerful presses and websites didn’t hesitate in levelling an abusive, inaccurate and defamatory outburst at this candidate.
It seems that Canada’s biggest newspaper chain is managed by paper tigers. They’ll take a hatchet to a loyal former colleague when the politics of the moment suit them, but are just as quick to hide behind legal niceties when exposed in the clear light of day.
Read More...A Statement From New York
November 13th, 2008
The following statement was released today. For immediate background, please see the entries Disciplines Worth Fighting For and Malice Without Borders, located below on this homepage. Full details in our entries dating from October 20th.
NEW YORK, Nov. 13, 2008 – Journalist Arthur Kent, who was a candidate earlier this year in the provincial election in Alberta, Canada, has filed a libel lawsuit in New York’s State Supreme Court against Canadian media conglomerate Canwest Global, its National Post Company and related firms.
The action, No. 150198/2008, comes nine months after the worldwide publication on Canwest websites, and in several of the company’s newspapers across Canada, of an article written by one of its employees, Don Martin. Canwest’s newspapers refused to publish a rebuttal submitted by Kent, who later filed a defamation action against Canwest in Calgary, Canada.
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