Former Tory minister calls out CBC for 'spinning' news in favour of Trudeau
John Baird, who merely introduced Trudeau at the Australia-Canada Economic Leadership Forum in Toronto, accosted the 'publicly funded spin machine' for misquoting his speech.
A former Conservative MP and foreign affairs minister is taking the state broadcaster to task for spinning the news in favour of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
The CBC claimed that John Baird, an ardent supporter of Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre, praised Trudeau's leadership during a conference on Tuesday.
Baird, who merely introduced Trudeau at the Australia-Canada Economic Leadership Forum in Toronto, accosted the "publicly funded spin machine" for misquoting his speech.
He accused the state broadcaster of "manipulating" the facts when he said it was his "great privilege to introduce one of the most successful political leaders of our generation," referring to Trudeau.
"The CBC manipulated my remarks to sow discord in the Conservative Party," tweeted Baird.
"Political success does not equal competent leadership of Canada. Pierre Poilievre will be the next Prime Minister of Canada and end 8 years of Liberal waste, corruption, and incompetence."
The Liberal Party’s publicly funded spin machine is back at it. Political success does not equal competent leadership of Canada. @PierrePoilievre will be the next Prime Minister of Canada and end 8 years of Liberal waste, corruption, and incompetence. https://t.co/8R3dObjDkE
— John Baird (@Baird) July 18, 2023
Baird then issued an endorsement for Poilievre to be Canada's next prime minister. "I support my friend Pierre Poilievre…full stop."
He added the #defundtheCBC hashtag in his endorsement, starting an online frenzy against the state broadcaster.
"Thought CBC couldn't stoop any lower, and they just proved me wrong — shame on you, CBC," one user said.
"CBC is in desperate overdrive," said another.
"This is exactly the kind of story that gives licence to partisan opponents of CBC News," wrote David McLaughlin, the president and CEO of the Ottawa-based Institute on Governance.
"Labelling a [prime minister] who has won three successive elections as 'most successful' is neither newsworthy nor a stretch. It was what used to be called a 'grace note' in [Canadian] politics."
Despite getting $1.4 billion in government funding, Canada's state broadcaster is taking issue with Twitter's decision to brand it 'government-funded.'https://t.co/ROJwukBYVN
— Rebel News (@RebelNewsOnline) April 17, 2023
In February, the Forum for Research and Policy in Communications (FRPC) uncovered significant "inconsistencies in [the] presentation" of the CBC's annual reports from 1937 to 2019. They said these "inconsistencies" made tracking the broadcaster's funding and performance difficult.
The FRPC report found the CBC provided "little objective information" in its annual reports on [fulfilling] its mandate and "so little consistent historical financial information."
They suggest Parliament's continued financial support for the broadcaster "cannot be easily assessed," estimating it has cost Canadian taxpayers approximately $80 billion since 1937.
"CBC today provides little if any, detailed information about the availability of its services in Canada and their use by the public, or about the programming that it produces each year," reads the FRPC analysis.
"Canadians should be allowed to choose which news outlet to support voluntarily. Other media organizations shouldn't be forced to compete with the taxpayer-funded CBC," added Franco Terrazzano, Federal Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF).
"It's time to defund the CBC."
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