CTV Calgary has been criticized for airing a questionable anti-abortion poll

Sooner or later, every news organization gets caught up in a questionable story.

Best practice is the right way to deal with it is to admit it as soon as you realize what happened, say you're really, really sorry, and then try harder to make sure it never happens again.

It's inconvenient and not very pleasant, but it will increase your credibility in the long run – or at least significantly reduce the damage to your reputation.

CTV Calgary seems to have missed this important lesson, swayed by claims of a robotic survey that, according to the broadcaster's original online story, suggests that most Albertans are required to tell their parents about minors who want an abortion. .

Given the blurring of events that followed CTV's release of the report, it seems unlikely that Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and her United Conservative Party (UCP) will release an interactive voice response technology poll at the same time. It was a total fluke that schools plan to notify parents if children want to change their names or pronouns.

When CTV filed its original story Monday afternoon, it already did negative online comment there was no excuse for him not to be suspicious of the claims of a company claiming to be online because it suggested something was wrong with the survey.National Public Research Canada.”

Consider what the survey company is called Canadian National Population Survey and its parent company PrimeContact Research Group said:

“We are compelled to do PrimeContact and its subsidiary National Public Research Canada Publicly condemns a recent poll aired by CTVsharing the name of a survey company that is very similar to our company's name,” the statement said.

“In our opinion, CTV has irresponsibly published findings from a highly questionable source identified as National Public Research Canada.” completely unrelated to our organization, the Canadian National Public Survey“, the message says.

Accusing CTV of “courage” for airing a poll that “lacks methodological rigor and transparency,” the statement continued: “We categorically deny any association with this poll and 'National Public Research Canada.'”

This is a position that needs no colorful adjectives to describe it!

The Legitimate Pollster included a copy of his complaint to CTV on Monday afternoon, suggesting the network withdraw the story, and the reporter's embarrassing response: “I wrote the article at the suggestion of my boss, Dawn Walton.”

Dear Alberta Survey Janet Brown added two bits on social media: “Strong and reasoned condemnation of @CTVCalgary and @ctvedmonton. Thank you @PrimeContact.”

On Tuesday afternoon, CTV posted a rewrite of its original story with a new headline, “Questions Raised by Alberta Abortion Parental Consent Survey,” with a note explaining that Richard Durr is the man behind Alberta Blue Strategies. Director of Pro-Life Alberta Political Association.

Pro-Life Alberta is a “political party” created to allow Albertans to receive tax credits for donating to an anti-reproductive rights organization allowed to survive through Alberta elections. Furthermore, it is clear that some legislative change is needed to remedy this situation – a change that the UCP is unlikely to be keen on as Pro-Life Alberta does not field candidates against it in many ridings and in effect acts as its enabler. campaign machine.

Minutes before publishing a revised version of Monday's story, CTV also published a new story: “Province-wide poll on parental rights of minors seeking abortions in Alberta conducted by company owned by Calgary-based conservative think tank. , CTV News learned.

The story quoted Durr's statement defending a poll from the polling organization that outlined its leader's anti-abortion beliefs. “Anyone who doubts the veracity of the results can put their money where their mouth is and see for themselves: Most Albertans recognize that parental rights should include consent and/or notification if their minor child is to undergo an irreversible surgical procedure. about having an abortion,” the report said.

At the same time, independent journalists and researchers also paid attention to the survey.

Duncan Kinney Performance report In corporate filings, National Public Research Canada published the story, indicating that it is a subsidiary of Alberta Blue Strategies, which it described as a “conservative voter communications firm and call center run by Richard Durr.”

Kinney also noted that “National Public Research Canada is not a member of the Canadian Research Insights Council,” citing CIRC CEO John Tabon as saying that “this research does not meet the organization's standards.”

According to Kinney, Anti-Hate Canada also examined metadata attached to the survey ad and linked it to Alice Golob, executive director of another anti-abortion group, RightNow.

In a rerun of Tuesday's episode, CTV defended Golob's request for parental consent for the abortion. There was no mention of whether he might be included in the survey.

“CTV Calgary has yet to fully exonerate themselves for this blatant distortion of journalism,” Kinney explained in his story.

As of this morning, there has been no apology or further explanation from CTV for its original story, and no promise to do better.

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