Tech giants face the music on news code

The ‘anti-democratic’ practices and unchecked market power of tech giants Google and Facebook will come under intense scrutiny on Friday.

Liberal senator Andrew Bragg. Picture: AAP

The “anti-democratic” practices and unchecked market power of tech giants Google and Facebook will come under intense scrutiny on Friday, with a Senate committee set to demand the digital ­behemoths explain their refusal to compensate media companies for the content they use.

With the federal government’s news media bargaining code — which is designed to support a diverse and financially sustainable Australian news media sector — due to be voted on in the Senate next month, representatives from Google, Facebook and senior media executives will front the hearing in Canberra to make their final pitches to the panel of cross-party senators.

A host of media companies, ­including News Corp, Nine, and public broadcasters ABC and SBS, have made submissions to the committee ahead of the hearing, with the news outlets arguing that if they are not adequately remunerated for their content by the digital platforms, the Australian news media industry cannot be sustained.

Liberal senator Andrew Bragg, who is a member of the six-person Senate standing committee conducting the hearing, told The Australian the tech giants would be asked to justify their conduct on a range of media issues.

“They have made a lot of big claims, and we will have to test them in detail,” he said.

Among those claims is that if the code becomes law, Google’s business in Australia would no longer be financially viable.

The company last year threatened to exit the Australian market altogether if it was forced to pay media companies for their journalism under the federal government’s proposed model, which would see the amount of compensation determined by an independent arbitrator if the parties couldn’t reach an agreement.

It’s also understood that Google Australia managing director Melanie Silva will be asked for a “please explain” on the timing of the company’s rollout of a so-called “experiment” earlier this month, which resulted in the burying of links from traditional media outlets in some searches.

Another member of the Senate committee told The Australian the hearing would focus heavily on the lack of regulatory oversight on Google and Facebook, and the consequences for media businesses of the “unchecked digital monopolies”.

“The federal government’s code is simply proposing a small level of regulation on these companies, which to date have been operating in a fairly anti-democratic way,” the senator said.

Several senior media executives will attend the hearing in Canberra, including Campbell Reid and Georgia-Kate Schubert from News Corp, which publishes The Australian, Nine’s Chris Janz and the ABC’s director of strategy, Mark Tapley.

A News Corp spokesman said: “We expect to continue our strong support for the introduction of the code of conduct.”

Nine will be reminding the committee “of the monopoly ­position of the global platforms”, a network spokesperson said.