Ottawa, February 16, 1999 – The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) today released its decision concerning a broadcast of The John and JJ Show on CFUN-AM (Vancouver). During the broadcast in question, the hosts discussed Canada’s refugee policy in light of a crime committed by a man who, despite an earlier deportation order, had remained in the country because China had not yet issued the necessary travel documents. A listener complained that comments made by the hosts about Canada’s open-door immigration policy “cast suspicion on all immigrants” and were “irresponsible” as they “encourag[ed] hatred and violence”.
The B.C. Regional Council considered the complaint under the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ (CAB) Code of Ethics. It found no Code violation. The Council noted that “while John and J.J. did not mince words in expressing their disgust with respect to the gruesome murder in Vancouver which resulted in part from the bureaucratic delays in executing the deportation of a Chinese national, they were also careful not to ‘paint with the same brush’ all refugee claimants or immigrants”.
The Council considers that in the circumstances, John and J.J.’s discussion of Canada’s refugee policy, and of the specific case of Wing Fu Hau, did not cross the line into abusively discriminatory comment. Specifically, the Council considers that the hosts’ use of an analogy to “garbage” and “refuse” did not constitute a breach of the Codes. The analogy was not, in the Council’s view, used to discriminate against all refugees but rather to make the hosts’ point concerning flaws in Canada’s “open-door” refugee policy. The Council notes that, while freedom of expression has its limits in Canada, the freedom to criticize Government policies and practices is a core example of freedom of expression, in some senses the very root of that right in a democratic system. Unless, therefore, the exploiter of that right to challenge Government policies has overstepped another equally basic standard, such as, for example, the right of members of an identifiable group to be free from abuse, that right to challenge will be sustained. In this case, the Council finds that the exercise of their freedom of expression by the hosts, John and JJ, must outweigh any danger, as suggested by the complainant, that the references “cast suspicion on all immigrants.”
Canada’s private broadcasters have created industry standards in the form of Codes on ethics, gender portrayal and television violence by which they expect their members will abide. They also created the CBSC, which is the self-regulatory body with the responsibility of administering those Codes, as well as the Code dealing with journalistic practices created by the Radio Television News Directors Association Canada (RTNDA). More than 430 radio and television stations and specialty services from across Canada are members of the Council.
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All CBSC decisions, Codes, links to members’ and other web sites, and related information are available on the World Wide Web at www.cbsc.ca. For more information, please contact the National Chair of the CBSC, Ron Cohen, at (###) ###-####.