Canadian broadcasters 1, fake news 0.

From the Globe and Mail:

CRTC ditches bid to allow fake news

Canada’s broadcasting regulator has abandoned its attempt to change a regulation that prohibits the dissemination of false or misleading news.

The decision from the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission followed a meeting last week of Parliament’s joint committee for the scrutiny of regulations, which ended its 10-year bid to get the regulation to comply with the law.

A 1992 Canadian Supreme Court ruling in the prosecution of a Holocaust denier “found that the Charter of Rights provision protecting freedom of expression meant a person could not be charged for spreading false information.”

Under pressure, the CRTC “[considered] changing the regulation to apply only in cases when broadcasters know the information they are sharing is untrue and when it ‘endangers or is likely to endanger the lives, health or safety of the public.'”

But, the G&M reports:

[T]he CRTC’s call for public input on the proposal resulted in a tidal wave of angry responses from Canadians who said they feared such a move would open the door to Fox TV-style news and reduce their ability to determine what is true and what is false.

Not to get technical about it, but Fox TV-style news would be The Simpson’s Kent Brockman.

Fox News-style news, however, would be this:

Can’t fathom why Canadians wouldn’t want a piece of that.