Does CBC really deserve to be defunded?

By Lethbridge Herald on February 26, 2025.

DOUG FIRBY – TROY MEDIA

The CBC/Radio-Canada has become a political football this election cycle, with Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre promising to “defund” it if he gains power in the upcoming federal election.

Once again, the leader of the Opposition finds that playing to his MAGA-lite freedom fighters puts him offside with the moderate Canadians whose support he needs. For all his claims of listening to ordinary Canadians, he seems tone-deaf about Canada’s national broadcaster.

Many of us get exasperated with the CBC’s Toronto-centric perspective, perceived liberal bias, and at times preachy tone. But we don’t see its destruction as a solution—we just want it to be better.

Polling shows strong support for the CBC in some form. A survey of 2,055 adults conducted for McGill University’s Centre for Media, Technology and Democracy found that 78 per cent of Canadians want CBC/Radio-Canada to continue—if it addresses major criticisms. The top four, ranked in order, are:

• unreliable funding

• advertising

• biased reporting, and

• telling people what to think.

Supporters see it as a vital tool in shaping Canadian cultural identity, made more urgent by U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats to annex our country. When asked whether a public broadcaster like CBC/Radio-Canada is still essential in the digital age, eight in 10 respondents to the McGill survey said it was either equally or more important than before.

Critics, however, argue that it serves as a propaganda tool for elite Liberal interests. Poilievre—whose party is leading in the polls—receives wild cheers from partisan audiences when he vows to defund the CBC.

But as deep as the divide is, there’s one uncomfortable truth most people agree on—the CBC needs to address deep-rooted dysfunction that undermines its ability to fulfill its mandate.

The CBC is a troubled puppy. And nothing short of sustained soul-searching will restore its health.

Why do conservative Canadians feel such acrimony toward the CBC? Mostly because they don’t feel they get a fair shake. Reporters are sworn to objectivity, but sometimes it seems like they’re just going through the motions, paying lip service to perspectives from the right. After all, the Poilievre set is not their tribe. (And here I thought the only tribe reporters belonged to was the Truth Tribe.)

The CBC is also captive to political correctness. This is why it demoted senior reporter Wendy Mesley for repeating in a private meeting at The Corp the provocative title of a book by Pierre Vallières, a leader of the Front de libération du Québec. (Offensive because the title included the N-word.)

It also failed to replace some of its charming curmudgeons, including the late Rex Murphy, whose right-of-centre views clashed with the network’s leadership.

The news department, which helps fill the void left by collapsing newspapers and local commercial TV and radio, does things that leave me baffled. The National, its flagship nightly newscast, is branded as a “show”—as if it’s there to entertain rather than inform. The night of the crash at Ronald Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C., it devoted almost the entire hour to having Paul Hunter speculate from across the Potomac River on the fate of the passengers (who were obviously dead). One can only assume the outpouring of grief was amplified by the fact that CBC reporters use the airport regularly.

Meanwhile, CBC’s local television newscasts remain puzzling, typically drawing the lowest ratings in competitive Canadian markets. In Calgary, for example, the CBC’s daily television broadcast reaches just 20,000 people on average.

But there are positives, too, notably in the growth of its digital audience. And its entertainment division has produced some winning programs. Nothing compares to Jonny Harris’s Still Standing. North of North, the comedy set in Iqaluit, is groundbreaking, and Allan Hawco’s Saint-Pierre is a police procedural with an authentic Canadian twist.

So, the CBC’s record as a bastion of Canadian culture is mixed. There’s little evidence it deserves a massive funding boost. But there’s also no strong argument for doing away with it.

Before increasing CBC funding, any government must explore how the broadcaster can improve. Can it appeal to all Canadians, regardless of political stripe? Who are the faceless bureaucrats in Toronto making the calls? Based on what I see, some of them need to go.

Let’s put the cards on the table. The U.S. media juggernaut is so powerful that no Canadian media company stands a chance without some government support. The collapse of private news media proves the point. Don’t believe those who claim they’d do better if only the CBC were gone—advertisers just aren’t interested in supper-hour news anymore.

Success shouldn’t mean getting a job in Hollywood. It should mean creating a space where great stars can thrive at home. Quebec has done it—thanks to the French language as a cultural barrier. The rest of Canada could do it, too.

But not with the CBC as it is. If it wants to regain relevance, it must understand what ordinary people are all about. Only then might it deserve the cash it so desperately seeks.

Doug Firby is an award-winning editorial writer with over four decades of experience working for newspapers, magazines and online publications in Ontario and western Canada. Previously, he served as Editorial Page Editor at the Calgary Herald.