The newspaper lobby is demanding its $595 million “temporary” bailout be extended with double the federal subsidies. “Address this,” lobbyist Paul Deegan, CEO of News Media Canada, wrote MPs.

“The financial situation for most news publishers is extremely challenging,” Deegan wrote the Commons finance committee. “It will remain so for many in the short to medium term.”

Parliament in 2019 amended the Income Tax Act to pay cabinet-approved publishers a 25 percent payroll rebate to a maximum $13,750 per newsroom employee. The rebate must increase to 35 percent on a higher pay calculation to a maximum $29,750, wrote Deegan.