Local news cuts at Bell come after it was granted $40M in regulatory relief: St-Onge

Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge is accusing Bell Media of breaking its promise to put money into native news after the corporate was granted greater than $40 million in annual regulatory aid.

That’s the identical quantity the corporate says its news division, which incorporates CTV News and BNN Bloomberg, is shedding yearly.

Facing $40 million in annual working losses, Bell Media is reducing 4,800 jobs amid across-the-board cuts at guardian firm BCE Inc., which has increased general working income than a 12 months in the past.

The firm is laying the blame for cuts on the ft of regulators and policymakers.

But St-Onge says the federal government has labored to assist the news business, and in some unspecified time in the future firms must chip in, too.

The Liberal authorities’s new Online Streaming Act got here into impact final April and abolished sure licensing charges, which St-Onge says will save the corporate some $40 million a 12 months.