The Milewski Affair
and the
Question of Balance *

The controversy over what has come to be known as the "Milewski Affair" has rallied commentators in our two national papers to the defense of CBC journalist Terry Milewski. Milewski was removed from APEC coverage because the CBC's internal review concluded that "he had become part of the story". He was later suspended for an additional 15 days for writing an op-ed piece in the Globe and Mail,, without his employer’s consent, defending his actions.

In the Globe and Mail,, and to a lesser extent the National Post, Canadian journalists are standing by their comrade and defending his actions. Jan Wong in her November 12, 1998 Globe and Mail column, "A reporter for the gagging," saw no problems with him supplying questions to his sources: "What’s so secret about a list of questions? Sharing them doesn’t violate the CBC’s code of conduct. And as far as I know, the act is still legal in this country." Rick Salutin in his Globe and Mail media column alleged, "Because a CBC reporter did a great job exposing the craven behaviour of the Prime Minister, which none of the private media did, and was attacked by the PM's media flunkies for it, therefore the CBC shouldn't exist?" (Emphasis original). Others, such as Southam News contributor George Jonas, argued in Milewski’s defense that research is rarely pure: "It can have elements of a con game on both sides."

Peter Donolo, Director of Communications for the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) wrote a formal complaint to the CBC ombudsman about Milewski's APEC coverage. Journalists ranging from the columnists in the dailies to the editorial cartoonists took great offense at the way Milewski was attacked by the PMO. The Globe and Mail’s editorial cartoon on November 13 showed a picture of Darth Vader stamping copy into two baskets, one called "Defensible Journalism" the other "Indefensible Journalism." Rick Salutin remarked, "Donolo didn't challenge Milewski's story, just his motives and character... I'd prefer to be judged on the outcome." As a matter of fact, Donolo did challenge Milewski’s story. The CBC web page provides the exchange of letters between the PMO and the CBC. In the letter of complaint written by Donolo on October 18, 1998, he cites a specific case where the PMO thought Milewski was biased: "On that same newscast, Mr. Milewski closed his report with this sarcastic and biased commentary: 'It is true that not all of the documents dug up by the Complaints Commission put the Prime Minister’s actions in a negative light. In fact, after the summit, a diplomatic cable reported that a senior aide to President Suharto congratulated Canada saying ‘my president was very pleased...'" Donolo later asked the CBC to assess whether in its overall tone and emphasis, in addition to specific editorial choices, CBC television news has displayed bias and unfairness on this issue, and whether full and proper context was supplied in reporting documents and events surrounding APEC.

The view that Milewski should be judged by the content of his reports is one of the few things that commentators, the PMO, and the CBC all agree upon. For example, in her November 12 column, Jan Wong argued, “What matters is how he serves his audience. Is his reporting accurate? Balanced? Interesting? Then fine.”

These same people also tend to agree on one other thing: that Terry Milewski aggressively pursued and reported the story. In an October 18, 1998 letter responding to Mr. Donolo’s complaint, Bob Culbert wrote that Milewski was an “aggressive reporter developing a strong point of view on a major controversial story.” He further argued that “journalists should be judged primarily by what they put to air, not by the theories or hypotheses or opinions held in private or internally.”

Indeed, putting aside how Milewski got his story, the question left hanging is whether the coverage was balanced. (Whether or not it was interesting we’ll leave to the columnists to decide.) To answer the first question the National Media Archive analyzed all of Terry Milewski’s stories that could be found on the CBC transcript database on the APEC meetings, including the ones first reported in 1997 to the last one he filed before being pulled off the story on October 25, 1998. In all, Milewski filed 16 stories on the APEC summit and its aftermath. Included in this analysis are headlines that relate directly to Milewski’s coverage.

Milewski’s story implicated government in policy actions

The initial complaint from the Prime Minister’s office was that Terry Milewski “promote[d] a one-sided account.” The main theme of Milewski’s story was what role the government in general and the Prime Minister’s office in particular played in the events involving the protesters and the police at the APEC conference in Vancouver in November 1997. As figure 1 shows, nearly half of the coverage (47 percent) focused primarily on the government. This is somewhat ironic since it was the RCMP who ostensibly restricted the APEC protesters, and it was the RCMP who used the pepper spray. Nonetheless, almost one-quarter (23 percent) of Milewski’s coverage discussed the RCMP’s role. For example, on November 27, 1997, Milewski reported: “Two days after the pepper spray has cleared, there’s a growing row over allegations of police overkill and civil rights violations. Today the Prime Minister was again asked to defend the plentiful use of pepper spray against demonstrators.”

Click Here to View Figure 1

The link between the actions of the RCMP and the federal government became clearer in a September 14, 1998 story by Milewski: “So the inquiry is not just going to be about the front-line Mounties who wielded the famous pepper spray at APEC. Instead it’s looking at the RCMP’s internal memos reported here last week saying: ‘PM specific wish... that leaders not be distracted by demos.’” Similarly, on September 21, 1998, Milewski reported: “At the University of British Columbia the cloud of pepper spray seems to linger to this day, but the reasons for it are becoming clearer. CBC News has obtained new evidence that the policy of keeping protesters out of sight was set by the government, not the RCMP, and that the Mounties’ warnings of a security nightmare were ignored.” A detailed examination of these two quotes illustrates that Milewski was not above using metaphorical flourishes. In his original 1997 report, Milewski had said that the pepper spray had cleared two days after the event, but by the fall of 1998 it was still lingering over UBC.

Allegations of the PMO’s involvement were the main theme of Milewski’s reports. Neutral descriptions comprised 8 percent of that attention (figure 2). For example, on September 1, 1998, Milewski reported that “in the end, there was no embarrassment as the APEC leaders posed for their photo op, insulated from any hint of protest.” Two percent of the coverage was positive, that is, it portrayed the government in a favourable light. However, even these seemingly positive statements could be construed as damning to the Prime Minister. For example, in one story, President Suharto’s former ambassador to Canada remarked that the Prime Minister handled the embarrassment “well, very well.” While Benjamin Parwoto endorsed Chretien’s actions, the story’s implications were that Chretien’s actions were anything but favourable. Milewski ended the story with the following statement: “Parwoto made it clear that he does not think the Prime Minister did anything unusual on Suharto’s behalf. He did insist, though, that Chretien knew and understood that Suharto’s physical security was not an issue, and that potential embarrassment was. As for how the Prime Minister handled that embarrassment issue, Parwoto said `well, very well.’“ In other words, even the few seemingly favourable remarks made about the government and the PMO were not presented particularly emphatically.

Click Here to View Figure 2

More significant is the volume of coverage supporting allegations that the Prime Minister, or representatives from his office, ordered that the protestors be kept away from the APEC leaders. Forty percent of the attention argued that the federal government or the PMO gave the orders to keep the protestors away from the APEC leaders. For example, in his September 8, 1998 story, Milewski claimed: “The RCMP also had orders from the Prime Minister to shut down a perfectly legal protest camp near the summit site.” Statements contradicting those allegations comprised 16 percent of the attention. For example, after offering several more allegations from the protesters in the above noted story, Milewski provided first the Prime Minister’s and then the RCMP’s response. In this quote, while the RCMP offer their reason for the actions at APEC, Milewski himself questioned those reasons: “The RCMP also continued to claim that it was motivated by security, not by politics. But that’s going to be very hard to square with these new documents which go before a public inquiry next week. There, some of the students involved hope to subpoena the Prime Minister and to prove that this was not about keeping a dictator safe, but about keeping him happy.”

A further 21 percent of that coverage portrayed the government in a negative light. For example, on September 29, 1998, Milewski ended his story saying: “In fact, the proper setting for demonstrations seems to have been anywhere the leaders could not see them. When the leaders’ motorcade passed by, the officially-designated protest site was behind a double security fence 100 metres away. When another protest appeared next to the motorcade route, the RCMP forced students to remove their signs. If, as the Vanderloo memo says, the concern was embarrassment, not security, then it will be more ammunition for the lawsuit against the Prime Minister.”

In addition to the overtly unfavourable attention, Milewski also offered information that could not be construed as completely favourable or unfavourable, and therefore was categorized as “mixed.” Often these statements were phrased as questions. For example, on the September 1, 1998 report, Milewski made this comment: “That was not the only sign that the promises about visible protests were not worth much.” The story ended with these comments from Milewski: “In the end, of course, it’ll be up to the courts to decide whether the RCMP had proper legal grounds for its actions and whether anyone’s civil liberties were violated. But for now, as long as both the RCMP and the Prime Minister’s Office refuse to comment, several unanswered questions remain: if the security plan was good enough for the RCMP, why was it not good enough for the Prime Minister’s Office? Did the Prime Minister offer any assurances to visiting leaders that demonstrators would be kept out of sight? And if he didn’t, why were they kept out of sight?”

Apart from claiming that the PMO gave the orders to keep the protesters away from the APEC leaders, a significant amount of coverage focused on what happened during the APEC protests. Twenty-three percent examined the actions of the RCMP using pepper spray, arresting protesters without charges, and keeping the protesters away from the APEC leaders (figure 1).

Eleven percent of the attention discussed what the protesters were doing and the claims they were making. In the September 1, 1998 documentary Mile- wski noted: “[Protester Craig] Jones is not alone in feeling he was muzzled. Jodi Morris had a sign saying ”freedom of speech" and that wasn’t allowed either. All she could do was paint her hands red and hold them up, but the passing leaders just thought she was waving." A quote from Jodi Morris was provided: “And I felt so silenced. I felt that my most visible means of saying ‘this is what I believe in,’ was taken away from me. And instead, they thought we were waving and the chance I had to express myself had been lost.”

Needless to say, while Milewski presented the government as orchestrating the actions of the RCMP to protect a foreign dictator, he also presented the protestors in a positive manner. On a few occasions, Milewski would directly contrast the activities and rhetoric of the leaders inside the Summit with that of the protesters outside. For example on November 25, 1997, Milewski’s opening comment was, “Liberal doses of pepper spray, and dozens of noisy arrests threw sharp light on the debate over APEC and human rights. The scene was the security perimeter at UBC where the leaders were pledging themselves to economic and social well-being.”

Government representatives provide the most commentary

Another way to measure balance is to examine the sources used, and how they were featured in the newscasts. As figure 3 shows, 46 percent of the statements came from Milewski or an anchor introducing the story. Of the sources, the federal government and its representatives, either through direct quotes or paraphrases by Milewski, were most frequently used, comprising 26 percent of the sources’ statements. Protestors accounted for 18 percent of the sources’ statements. All other commentators comprised less than 5 percent each of sources’ statements.

Clearly, not all government representatives spoke in favour of the government or the Prime Minister’s actions. A number of leaked documents, attributed to the RCMP, implicated the Prime Minister’s office in the way the protesters were treated. Milewski’s coverage spotlighted the government and RCMP’s actions. The highest proportion of critical comments was directed toward the RCMP. For example, on November 27, 1997, Milewski reported: “Then there is the question of whether the RCMP gave people sufficient warning before using pepper spray.” He then showed a clip of RCMP officer Hugh Stewart at the site of the APEC Summit talking to the protesters: “I am going to use force—whatever force I deem necessary. I do not intend to fool around. I intend to clear this road and I intend to clear it now. Put the dogs on the side. You are going that way!” Milewski then ended the story reporting: “In this case, a CBC cameraman was sprayed in the face, along with some demonstrators who the RCMP agrees were trying to leave. The force says all this was thought `reasonable’ at the time, but there will be a full review.”

Click Here to View Figure 3

Of specific individuals used in the reports, Craig Jones was featured most prominently. In total, he provided 6 percent of the statements in Milewski’s reports. Figure 4 provides the top 10 sources presented in Milewski’s stories.

Problematic in Milewski’s coverage is the use of unnamed sources. Seven percent of the comments were attributed to people in general, but no one person in particular. These were instances where Milewski would attribute comments to “critics,” the “RCMP,” the “PMO,” “students,” or “observers.” For example, on the September 1, 1998 documentary, Milewski indicated that: “... the Prime Minister’s office confirms that its officials did want the protest areas moved back. But the PMO has not answered the question, `why’? And given that the RCMP had already approved the previous lines on security grounds, observers on campus are convinced that security was not an issue: visibility was.” (Emphasis added.) In light of the information regarding Milewski giving questions to the student protestors, his reference to questions that remain unanswered by critics becomes suspect. Audiences might want to question whether these so-called observers are people other than Milewski himself.

Government gets the last word more often than protesters

In the complaint to the CBC, Donolo charged that the protestors received preferential treatment. He argued that “Terry Milewski may from the beginning have had a specific and one-sided agenda on this issue. It appears Mr. Milewski has set out from the beginning to side with complainants, that he has secretly conspired with a complainant on legal strategies, and that he has sought to portray the government, in his own words, as ‘the forces of Darkness.’”

With respect to the journalistic tradition of letting different people have the first and last word, Milewski’s coverage tends to favour the government source over the protester or critic. Interestingly, the protestors provided the first word in 25 percent of the stories, compared with 16 percent for the government. But it was the government, and not the protesters that received the final say on more stories. Seventeen percent of the stories ended with a statement from the government, while 13 percent ended with a statement from the protestors. It should be acknowledged, however, that government sources were not always portrayed as defending the government or the PMO’s actions.

Conclusions

After carefully examining Terry Milewski's reports on a statement-by-statement basis, it is questionable if his reporting on the APEC Summit and its aftermath could be considered balanced. By most measures, Milewski did present a one-sided view of the issue. He focused on the protesters’ complaints (though he gave government representatives the most commentary and the last word most often), he presented leaked information that implicated the PMO, and he provided information that showed the RCMP were concerned that protester arrests were unrelated to the security of the APEC leaders. In addition, he presented stories which indicated that one of the APEC leaders (President Suharto of Indonesia) and his representatives were "thugs," and that they presented a danger to the protesters at UBC.

Click Here to View Figure 4

The government’s reasons for why APEC was held at UBC and why dictators would be hosted in Canada were given little coverage. Only three percent of the attention provided the context around why the Canadian government wanted the APEC summit to be a success.

The Milewski affair underlines a difficulty with most media criticism. Journalists often equate “fair” coverage with “balanced” coverage. The CBC Journalist Policy Handbook, which the CBC waves in front of its critics, is one example. It notes that there are “two kinds of balance and fairness in the handling of information programming, one provided by the journalists and the other provided by the CBC as a journalistic organization.”¹

While by most measures the reports by Milewski were not balanced, it is difficult to say whether they were fair. Examining the content alone only tells us what audiences saw on the nightly news. It does not tell us what information Milewski omitted from his reports. It does not tell us whether his reports were accurate. Those are the issues that decide whether the coverage was fair. The guiding principle on fairness, according to the CBC, is that "the information reports or reflects equitably the relevant facts and significant points of view; it deals fairly and ethically with persons, institutions, issues and events."² Whether anyone can determine if the coverage was "fair" probably depends on which side of the controversy one is on.

Notes

¹CBC Journalistic Policy, 1988, p. 7.

²CBC Journalistic Policy, 1988, p. 6.

^* This article originally appeared in the January 1999 edition of Fraser Forum. It was edited in September 2007 to correct several errors of fact and analysis.

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Last Modified: Wednesday, October 20, 1999.