Daily Brew'Why hurt everyone?' Union challenges CBC mandate to end paid speaking gigs
Of all the grenades thrown at Canadian media personalities on the issue of journalism ethics in recent months, the one tossed at CBC’s Amanda Lang may have the most powerful aftershock.
In the wake of allegations that the CBC business correspondent crossed ethical boundaries with how she handled her dealings with the Royal Bank of Canada, the national news network implemented serious changes – denying on-air personalities the right to accept payment for speaking appearances.
With its credibility under attack, the CBC clearly felt strong measures were necessary. But have they gone too far? The CBC’s union seems to think so, claiming the network is wrong to implement a “blanket prohibition” and vowing to oppose the measure.
"This new ban is a clear violation of our collective agreement, an infringement on our members’ rights and a dangerous precedent. The CBC took this unilateral decision without input and agreement from your union," the Canadian Media Guild said in a statement released Thursday.
“Of course we approve of CBC addressing any significant issue, that is not our objection,” Carmel Smyth, national president of the Canadian Media Guild, told Yahoo Canada News. “Having media workers engaged in outside activities can be positive … why hurt everyone?”
The CBC announced on Thursday it would no longer allow on-air journalists to make paid speaking appearances, following harsh criticism over the Amanda Lang controversy – in which it was revealed Lang was collecting speaking fees from RBC while covering the bank’s jobs outsourcing scandal.
The Canadaland news website alleges that Lang attempted to undermine another CBC reporter’s investigation into the affair, and later tried to limit the impact of the major story.
The Lang controversy comes after similar concerns were expressed about speaking fees collected by news anchor Peter Mansbridge and personality Rex Murphy.
At that time, CBC’s Editor-in-Chief Jennifer McGuire said while the optics were bad, neither had sacrificed their journalistic integrity. Still, the CBC’s rules about paid speaking engagements were tightened.
This time around, the crackdown seems to have ruffled some feathers.
According to the CBC announcement, on-air journalists will no longer be allowed to receive payment of any kind for appearances at external events. Freelance contributors, such as Murphy, will not be affected.
"A changing environment in which the public expects more transparency from institutions and the media is making the practice of paid outside activities for our journalists less acceptable to audiences," Jennifer McGuire and Michel Cormier, the heads of CBC’s English and French news services said in a statement.
"Given that paid appearances can create an adverse impact on the Corporation, CBC/Radio-Canada will no longer approve paid appearances by its on-air journalistic employees."
The proclamation, however, does not take into consideration all the journalists who make appropriate speaking appearances, often to the benefit of the community or the image of the journalism industry.
“Journalists and media workers in general are often articulate, educated – they have a lot to contribute to civil society,” Smyth said in an interview on Friday. “They are asked to be on panels, on reviews, sometimes on studies. They speak at schools, they are asked to do mentoring. Many of them write books, they go on book tours.
“They make many, many contributions to the community. Sometimes the work on those outside activities is time consuming. They may need to take time off work. They may need to take days to write something or prepare some material to say or to share. We believe that is a positive contribution to the community that can improve the image of journalists and improve the image of the CBC, for example. We have no problem with people being paid for that work.”
Further, the issue of “outside activities” is already covered in the CBC’s collective agreement.
According to the Canadian Media Guild/CBC agreement:
Employees shall be free to engage in activities, such as voluntary and/or paid work outside their hours of work, provided:
a) that such activities are not in competition with the media services of the corporation. This provision does not apply to temporary employees or freelancers;
b) that without permission, no employee may exploit his/her connection with the Corporation in the course of such activities; or
c) that such activity does not adversely affect his/her work for the Corporation.
The Canadian Media Guild says the collective agreement already gives CBC management the tools it needs to avoid conflict of interest situations. On-air employees must discuss their plans with their supervisor, who has 10 days to make a decision.
“Management has the authority to stop anything that could be gauged a conflict of interest from happening. We don’t believe they have to go to the extreme of banning everybody in a case where they already have the rules in place that they could handle without a change,” Smyth said.
“We feel they are forcing us to object by not following the rules that they have already agreed to follow – rules that already ensure journalistic integrity and also allow for positive contributions from journalists.”
The issue of paid speaking engagements specifically, and more generally the conflict of interest threat, stems beyond just a few names. Here is a list of public speaking appearances by CBC personalities in December, both paid and unpaid, for reference.
But that doesn’t mean the practice is wrong, just that its execution may be occasionally flawed. Smyth says rather than ban everyone from speaking engagements, managers should more properly govern against potential conflicts of interest.
“Managers have to be willing to manage,” she said. “If someone comes forward and has a discussion about where they are speaking, what they are doing, what event they are attending, I think it would be fairly clear to make a decision one way or the other.”
