When the dust settles on the confrontations related to the Competition Bureau and the real estate community, regardless of the outcome, I think it is understood that we have to have a governing body in place to oversee fairness in business and industry for everyone. I don’t think anyone can argue with that.
The problem is keeping that governing body fair. We have to do all we can to make sure the people who make the rules that keep everybody on the straight and narrow in business are honest themselves.
Isn’t that what it all comes down to here? Aren’t the most hurtful allegations on all sides of this whole thing really about the integrity of who makes the rules and who uses them and who gets an advantage from them?
We must remember that overseeing the people that oversee business is up to us. We must always demand integrity of our overseers. We must always stay aware of all the issues because at the end of the day the power is ours at the ballot box. Remember what happened here when the election is called.
This brings me to the media. As much as I watch and read about the real estate community getting picked apart and dragged through the mud by the media, the more I grow concerned about its integrity, and the more I am troubled by them getting their facts right.
Who oversees these guys? This is something that has troubled me for many years. Believe it or not the government used to guard the freedom of what was carried in the news a lot more over a hundred years ago.
It has been my understanding that the old Railway Act of Canada included a rule within its legislation that said the railway could not own what it carried. The reason for that was if the railway owned a product like furniture, for example, on one car and it was hauling furniture for someone else on another car, it could give special treatment to the furniture it owned. The railway might take special care that their furniture was not lost and it got to market as quickly as possible, whereas the furniture that belonged to someone else, like say their competitor in the furniture business, might get lost or delayed getting to market.
The Government of Canada was very wise in those days. They said the rule that the railway can’t own what it carries means that everybody competes fairly and openly.
The same rule applied when it came to the telegraph wires that the railway owned next to the railway tracks. The content or news carried over those wires could not be owned, let alone be monopolized by the railway.
The folks who oversaw that portion of the Railway Act were replaced by the Canadian Radio and Television Commission. Things changed under their watch. There were some large and complex lobby groups created by the owners of broadcast radio and television companies as well as cable providers and newspaper publishers that came calling. They were formed to influence opinion and solicit favour of the overseers of their business. All media related companies had lobby groups. The largest lobby group of all, I am told by hearsay, was operated by a cable company.
Before the days of the CRTC a cable company could not carry content that it owned because of the old Railway Act. The CRTC relaxed that rule and many others following consultation with lobby groups. Today a lot of what we see on cable TV is owned by the cable company. Especially sports properties. What will happen tomorrow? It makes me uncomfortable.
Today the vast majority of what we hear, read and see in the Canadian media is owned by two or three media conglomerates. This makes me the most uncomfortable of all. Look for yourself, who owns your local paper and radio station?
It begs the question that, if there are really only two or three media conglomerates controlling all the news we get, what’s going to happen if they merge? Who is going to stop them from telling us only what they want us to know?
Is there a governing body out there that looks out for us? Is there some organization that regulates competition and makes sure that there are other companies thriving in the media so that we can have a wide range of sources to make sure there is honesty and integrity in what is reported?
There is? Great, what are they called? The Competition Bureau? What are they doing? They’re busy? Busy with what?
Oh, they’re making sure the business of Realtors is being run the right way.
Heino Molls is publisher of REM. Email [email protected].
