National Post
Encyclopedia
The National Post is a Canadian English-language national newspaper based in Don Mills
, a district of Toronto
. The paper is owned by Postmedia Network
Inc. and is published Mondays through Saturdays. It was founded in 1998 by media magnate Conrad Black
.
Black established the Post to provide a voice for Canadian conservatives and to combat what he and many Canadian conservatives considered to be a liberal bias in Canadian newspapers . Black built the new paper around the Financial Post
, an established financial newspaper in Toronto which he purchased from Sun Media
in 1997. Financial Post was retained as the name of the new paper's business section.
Outside Toronto, the Post was built on the printing and distribution infrastructure of Black's national newspaper chain, formerly called Southam Newspapers
, that included papers such as the Ottawa Citizen
, Montreal Gazette, Edmonton Journal
, Calgary Herald
, and Vancouver Sun. The Post became Black's national flagship title, and massive amounts of start-up spending were dedicated to the product in its first few years under editor Ken Whyte.
Beyond his ideological vision, Black was attempting to compete more directly with Kenneth Thomson's media empire led by Canada's The Globe and Mail
, which Black perceived as an establishment
newspaper.
When the Post launched, its editorial stance was conservative
. It advocated a "unite-the-right" movement to create a viable alternative to the Liberal
government of Jean Chrétien
, and was a very large supporter of the Canadian Alliance
. The Post's op-ed page has included dissenting columns by liberals such as Linda McQuaig
, as well as conservatives including Mark Steyn
, Diane Francis
, and David Frum
.
The Posts unique magazine-style graphic and layout design won numerous awards. It was a retro
look – with echoes of 1930s design – jazzed up with eye-catching touches, such as oversized headlines, layering of multi-coloured type, reverse type, and bold colours. The original design of the "Post" was created by Lucie Lacava, a design consultant based in Montreal.
newspaper chain, and the remaining 50% in 2001. CanWest Global also owns the Global Television Network
, and there has been heavy cross-promotion between the company's newspaper and television properties.
In September 2001 editor Ken Whyte dropped the arts and sports sections, and the 116-year old Saturday Night
which had been the Post's weekend supplement. The move triggered a plunge in circulation from which the Post never fully recovered, even when the dropped sections were restored . Drastic budget cuts and staff layoffs triggered a number of staff defections as the newspaper's future seemed increasingly uncertain. Rumours about the Posts imminent closure were chronic.
In early 2003, Izzy Asper
purged top management at the Post, including Whyte and deputy editor Martin Newland
,while the paper continued to suffer heavy financial losses, which were estimated to have peaked at $60 million annually. Asper hired Matthew Fraser
as editor-in-chief. He had been the paper's media columnist from its inception. Fraser's tenure at the helm of the Post was marked by further budget cuts, restructuring, and staff layoffs, while doubts continued about the long-term future of the money-losing paper in its commercial war with the Globe and Mail. Fraser also was forced to fire two Post writers, including columnist Elizabeth Nickson
, for plagiarism. Another high-profile gossip columnist was fired for a salacious article about Canada's Governor General. Staff defections continued, notably among high-profile columnists such as Mark Steyn, who were loyal to the conservative Post under Conrad Black .
Under Fraser's editorship, the Post gained notoriety in Canadian media circles for its regular feature called "CBC Watch" – inspired in part by The Daily Telegraph
s "Beeb Watch" in Britain – which pointed out errors of fact and supposed evidence of left-wing and anti-Israeli bias at the public broadcaster. "CBC Watch" infuriated the CBC
's supporters, and critics claimed the Post was attacking the CBC to defend the commercial interests of the private television network, Global TV, owned by the Asper family. Izzy Asper
had long railed against the state-owned CBC, and once declared publicly that it should be "expunged" .
Izzy Asper died suddenly in October 2003, leaving his media empire in the hands of his two sons, Leonard
and David Asper
, the latter serving as chairman of the Post. Fraser departed in 2005 after the arrival of a new publisher, Les Pyette – the paper's seventh publisher in seven years. Pyette, a former publisher of the Toronto Sun
, aggressively took the Post downmarket with a tabloid-style tone and look. Fraser's deputy editor, Doug Kelly succeeded him as editor, though Pyette was regarded as firmly in control of the newsroom as a hands-on publisher. Pyette suddenly departed only seven months after his arrival, replaced by Gordon Fisher, a career Southam
newspaperman who had briefly served as interim publisher a few years earlier.
One of its columnists referred to Hezbollah as "cockroaches." Canadian pundits argue whether the Posts support of Israel is a legacy of its late founder's political ideology or a shrewd business manoeuvre.
The Post during Ken Whyte's editorship was strongly associated with the personality of proprietor Conrad Black, just as the paper during Matthew Fraser's editorship was associated with Izzy Asper. Today the Post has to some extent abandoned this ideology that gave the Post a distinct voice and loyal readership. Many of its rival papers, meanwhile, have copied its unique design and layout features. In a national newspaper market considered too thin to sustain two products, the Post has struggled against the Globe and Mail, which has the advantages of a loyal readership and a history stretching back to the mid-19th century. The Posts entry into the Canadian newspaper market, while dazzling during its aggressively marketed start-up phase, was poorly timed because the entire newspaper sector was entering a period of structural decline, which continues today, as readers turn towards the Internet and other sources for information and distraction. The Post effectively abandoned its claim as a national newspaper in 2006 as print subscriptions were dropped in Atlantic Canada
and then print editions were removed from all Atlantic Canadian newsstands except in Halifax as of 2007. The newspaper continued its erosion in 2008 with the announcement that weekday editions and home delivery would no longer be available in the provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan.
Politically, the Post has retained a conservative editorial stance under the Aspers' ownership, but has become markedly less strident. The Asper family has long been strong supporters of the Liberal Party of Canada
, though they have always had libertarian leanings. Izzy Asper was once leader of the Liberal Party in his home province of Manitoba
. The Aspers had controversially fired the publisher of the Ottawa Citizen
, Russell Mills
, for calling for the resignation of Liberal prime minister Jean Chrétien
.
However, the Post endorsed the Conservative Party of Canada
in the 2004 election
when Fraser was editor. The Conservatives narrowly lost that election to the Liberals. After the election, the Post surprised many of its conservative readers by shifting its support to the victorious Liberal government of prime minister Paul Martin
, and was highly critical of the Conservatives and their leader, Stephen Harper
. The paper switched camps again in the runup to the 2006 election
(in which the Conservatives won a minority government). During the election campaign, David Asper appeared publicly several times to endorse the Conservatives.
The Post continues to lose money — around $9.3 million in the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, 2009. The Post's circulation declined by one third from 2007 to 2009.
Like its competitor The Globe and Mail
, the Post publishes a separate edition in Toronto
, Canada's largest city and the fourth largest media centre in North America after New York City
, Los Angeles
and Chicago
. The Toronto edition includes additional local content not published in the edition distributed to the rest of Canada, and is printed at the Toronto Star
presses in Vaughan
.
On September 27, 2007, the Post unveiled a major redesign of its appearance. Guided by Gayle Grin, the Post's managing editor of design and graphics, the redesign features a standardization in the size of typeface and the number of typefaces used, cleaner font for charts and graphs, and — perhaps the most striking portion of the redesign — the move of the nameplate banner from the top to the left side of Page 1 as well as each section's front page.
In 2009, the paper announced that as a temporary cost-cutting measure, it will not print a Monday edition from July to September 2009. On October 29, 2009, Canwest Global announced that due to a lack of funding, The National Post might close down as of October 30, 2009, subject to moving the paper to a new holding company. Late on October 29, 2009 Ontario Superior Court Justice Sarah Pepall ruled in Canwest's favour and allowed the paper to move into a holding company.
Investment bankers hired by CanWest received no offers when they tried to sell the National Post earlier this year. Without a buyer closing the paper was studied, but the costs were greater than gains from liquidating assets. The lawyer for CanWest, in arguing to Justice Pepall, said the National Post added value to other papers in the CanWest chain.
s. Later on the same day, experts began coming forward to deny the accuracy of the Post story. The story proved to be false, but not before it had been picked up by a variety of other news media and generated comment from world leaders. Comments on the story by the Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper
caused Iran to summon Canada's ambassador to Tehran, Gordon E. Venner, for an explanation.
On May 24, 2006, the editor-in-chief of the newspaper, Doug Kelly, published an apology for the story on Page 2, admitting that it was false and the National Post had not exercised enough caution or checked enough sources.
Since 1998, the Canadian Islamic Congress
has been actively monitoring media coverage for anti-Muslim or anti-Islam sentiment and has issued reports highlighting its findings. It has opposed the use of phrases such as "Islamic guerrillas," "Islamic insurgency" and "Muslim militants" saying that terms like "militant" or "terrorist" should be used without a religious association "since no religion teaches or endorses terrorism, militancy or extremism." The Congress has singled out the National Post, saying the paper "consistently is No. 1" as an anti-Islam media outlet.
Don Mills
Don Mills is a mixed-use neighbourhood in the North York district of Toronto, Canada. It was developed to be a self-supporting "new town" and was at the time located outside of Toronto proper. Consisting of residential, commercial and industrial sub-districts, it was planned and developed by...
, a district of Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
. The paper is owned by Postmedia Network
Postmedia Network
Postmedia Network Canada Corp. is a Canadian media company headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, consisting of the publishing properties of the former Canwest, with primary operations in newspaper publishing, news gathering and Internet operations....
Inc. and is published Mondays through Saturdays. It was founded in 1998 by media magnate Conrad Black
Conrad Black
Conrad Moffat Black, Baron Black of Crossharbour, OC, KCSG, PC is a Canadian-born member of the British House of Lords, and a historian, columnist and publisher, who was for a time the third largest newspaper magnate in the world. Lord Black controlled Hollinger International, Inc...
.
Origins
Financial Post
The Financial Post was an English Canadian business newspaper, which published from 1907 to 1998. In 1998, the publication was folded into the new National Post, although the name Financial Post has been retained as the banner for that paper's business section and also lives on in the Post’s...
, an established financial newspaper in Toronto which he purchased from Sun Media
Sun Media
Sun Media Corporation is the owner of several widely read tabloid and broadsheet newspapers in Canada and the 49 percent owner of Sun News Network...
in 1997. Financial Post was retained as the name of the new paper's business section.
Outside Toronto, the Post was built on the printing and distribution infrastructure of Black's national newspaper chain, formerly called Southam Newspapers
Canwest News Service
Postmedia News is a national news agency with correspondents in Canada, Europe, and the United States and is part of the Canadian newspaper chain owned by Postmedia Network Inc.-History:...
, that included papers such as the Ottawa Citizen
Ottawa Citizen
The Ottawa Citizen is an English-language daily newspaper owned by Postmedia Network in Ottawa, Canada. According to the Canadian Newspaper Association, the paper had a 2008 weekly circulation of 900,197.- History :...
, Montreal Gazette, Edmonton Journal
Edmonton Journal
The Edmonton Journal is a daily newspaper in Edmonton, Alberta. It is part of the Postmedia Network.-History:The Journal was founded in 1903 by three local businessmen — John Macpherson, Arthur Moore and J.W. Cunningham — as a rival to Alberta's first newspaper, the 23-year-old...
, Calgary Herald
Calgary Herald
The Calgary Herald is a daily newspaper published in the Canadian city of Calgary, Alberta.- History :The paper was first published on August 31, 1883 by Andrew Armour and Thomas Braden as The Calgary Herald, Mining and Ranche Advocate and General Advertiser. It started as a weekly paper with only...
, and Vancouver Sun. The Post became Black's national flagship title, and massive amounts of start-up spending were dedicated to the product in its first few years under editor Ken Whyte.
Beyond his ideological vision, Black was attempting to compete more directly with Kenneth Thomson's media empire led by Canada's The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail is a nationally distributed Canadian newspaper, based in Toronto and printed in six cities across the country. With a weekly readership of approximately 1 million, it is Canada's largest-circulation national newspaper and second-largest daily newspaper after the Toronto Star...
, which Black perceived as an establishment
The Establishment
The Establishment is a term used to refer to a visible dominant group or elite that holds power or authority in a nation. The term suggests a closed social group which selects its own members...
newspaper.
When the Post launched, its editorial stance was conservative
Conservatism
Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism...
. It advocated a "unite-the-right" movement to create a viable alternative to the Liberal
Liberal Party of Canada
The Liberal Party of Canada , colloquially known as the Grits, is the oldest federally registered party in Canada. In the conventional political spectrum, the party sits between the centre and the centre-left. Historically the Liberal Party has positioned itself to the left of the Conservative...
government of Jean Chrétien
Jean Chrétien
Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien , known commonly as Jean Chrétien is a former Canadian politician who was the 20th Prime Minister of Canada. He served in the position for over ten years, from November 4, 1993 to December 12, 2003....
, and was a very large supporter of the Canadian Alliance
Canadian Alliance
The Canadian Alliance , formally the Canadian Reform Conservative Alliance , was a Canadian conservative political party that existed from 2000 to 2003. The party was the successor to the Reform Party of Canada and inherited its position as the Official Opposition in the House of Commons and held...
. The Post's op-ed page has included dissenting columns by liberals such as Linda McQuaig
Linda McQuaig
Linda Joy McQuaig is a Canadian journalist, columnist and non-fiction author.-History:Long a business reporter at the Globe and Mail, she subsequently wrote a column for the National Post before moving to her current job at the Toronto Star...
, as well as conservatives including Mark Steyn
Mark Steyn
Mark Steyn is a Canadian-born writer, conservative-leaning political commentator, and cultural critic. He has written five books, including America Alone: The End of the World As We Know It, a New York Times bestseller...
, Diane Francis
Diane Francis
Diane Francis is a Canadian journalist, author, and editor-at-large for the National Post newspaper since 1998. She was previously the Editor of the Financial Post from 1991 to 1998, when it was taken over by the National Post and incorporated into it...
, and David Frum
David Frum
David J. Frum is a Canadian American journalist active in both the United States and Canadian political arenas. A former economic speechwriter for President George W. Bush, he is also the author of the first "insider" book about the Bush presidency...
.
The Posts unique magazine-style graphic and layout design won numerous awards. It was a retro
Retro
Retro is a culturally outdated or aged style, trend, mode, or fashion, from the overall postmodern past, that has since that time become functionally or superficially the norm once again. The use of "retro" style iconography and imagery interjected into post-modern art, advertising, mass media, etc...
look – with echoes of 1930s design – jazzed up with eye-catching touches, such as oversized headlines, layering of multi-coloured type, reverse type, and bold colours. The original design of the "Post" was created by Lucie Lacava, a design consultant based in Montreal.
Sale to CanWest Global
The Post was unable to maintain momentum in the market without continuing to spend heavily and accumulate mounting financial losses. At the same time, Conrad Black was becoming preoccupied by impending troubles with his debt-heavy media empire, Hollinger International. Black finally decided to divest his Canadian media holdings, including the Post. Black sold the Post to CanWest Global Communications Corp, controlled by Israel Asper, in two stages – 50% in 2000, along with the entire SouthamSoutham
Southam is a small market town in the Stratford-on-Avon district of Warwickshire, England. The 2001 census recorded a population of 6,509 in the town.The nearest sizeable town to Southam is Leamington Spa, located roughly 7 miles to the west...
newspaper chain, and the remaining 50% in 2001. CanWest Global also owns the Global Television Network
Global Television Network
Global Television Network is an English language privately owned television network in Canada, owned by Calgary-based Shaw Communications, as part of its Shaw Media division...
, and there has been heavy cross-promotion between the company's newspaper and television properties.
In September 2001 editor Ken Whyte dropped the arts and sports sections, and the 116-year old Saturday Night
Saturday Night (magazine)
Saturday Night was a Canadian general interest magazine. It was founded in Toronto, Ontario in 1887.The publication was first established as a weekly broadsheet newspaper about public affairs and the arts, which was later expanded into a general interest magazine. The editor, Edmund E. Sheppard,...
which had been the Post's weekend supplement. The move triggered a plunge in circulation from which the Post never fully recovered, even when the dropped sections were restored . Drastic budget cuts and staff layoffs triggered a number of staff defections as the newspaper's future seemed increasingly uncertain. Rumours about the Posts imminent closure were chronic.
In early 2003, Izzy Asper
Izzy Asper
Israel Harold "Izzy" Asper, , Canadian tax lawyer and media magnate, was the founder of the now defunct CanWest Global Communications Corp and father to its former CEO and President Leonard Asper, former director and corporate secretary Gail Asper, as well as Executive Vice President David Asper...
purged top management at the Post, including Whyte and deputy editor Martin Newland
Martin Newland
Martin Newland is a British journalist and editor of The National, a national newspaper in Abu Dhabi. Previous to that, he was editor of The Daily Telegraph, a British broadsheet newspaper, from 2003–2005, replacing Charles Moore...
,while the paper continued to suffer heavy financial losses, which were estimated to have peaked at $60 million annually. Asper hired Matthew Fraser
Matthew Fraser (journalist)
Matthew William Fraser is a British-Canadian journalist, academic, and author known for his writing about the media industries...
as editor-in-chief. He had been the paper's media columnist from its inception. Fraser's tenure at the helm of the Post was marked by further budget cuts, restructuring, and staff layoffs, while doubts continued about the long-term future of the money-losing paper in its commercial war with the Globe and Mail. Fraser also was forced to fire two Post writers, including columnist Elizabeth Nickson
Elizabeth Nickson
Elizabeth Nickson is a Canadian writer and journalist In the late 1980s and early 1990s, she was European bureau chief of Life magazine.- Sources :...
, for plagiarism. Another high-profile gossip columnist was fired for a salacious article about Canada's Governor General. Staff defections continued, notably among high-profile columnists such as Mark Steyn, who were loyal to the conservative Post under Conrad Black .
Under Fraser's editorship, the Post gained notoriety in Canadian media circles for its regular feature called "CBC Watch" – inspired in part by The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
s "Beeb Watch" in Britain – which pointed out errors of fact and supposed evidence of left-wing and anti-Israeli bias at the public broadcaster. "CBC Watch" infuriated the CBC
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly known as CBC and officially as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian crown corporation that serves as the national public radio and television broadcaster...
's supporters, and critics claimed the Post was attacking the CBC to defend the commercial interests of the private television network, Global TV, owned by the Asper family. Izzy Asper
Izzy Asper
Israel Harold "Izzy" Asper, , Canadian tax lawyer and media magnate, was the founder of the now defunct CanWest Global Communications Corp and father to its former CEO and President Leonard Asper, former director and corporate secretary Gail Asper, as well as Executive Vice President David Asper...
had long railed against the state-owned CBC, and once declared publicly that it should be "expunged" .
Izzy Asper died suddenly in October 2003, leaving his media empire in the hands of his two sons, Leonard
Leonard Asper
Leonard Asper , is a Canadian businessperson and lawyer. He is a graduate of Brandeis University and the University of Toronto Law School.Leonard Asper is the son of the late Izzy Asper, founder of CanWest Global...
and David Asper
David Asper
David Asper is a Canadian businessman and lawyer. He is the former Executive Vice President of the Canadian media company CanWest Global Communications Corp. He is also a Professor at the Robson Hall Faculty of Law at the University of Manitoba.Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Asper is the eldest son...
, the latter serving as chairman of the Post. Fraser departed in 2005 after the arrival of a new publisher, Les Pyette – the paper's seventh publisher in seven years. Pyette, a former publisher of the Toronto Sun
Toronto Sun
The Toronto Sun is an English-language daily tabloid newspaper published in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is known for its daily Sunshine Girl feature and for what it sees as a populist conservative editorial stance.-History:...
, aggressively took the Post downmarket with a tabloid-style tone and look. Fraser's deputy editor, Doug Kelly succeeded him as editor, though Pyette was regarded as firmly in control of the newsroom as a hands-on publisher. Pyette suddenly departed only seven months after his arrival, replaced by Gordon Fisher, a career Southam
Southam
Southam is a small market town in the Stratford-on-Avon district of Warwickshire, England. The 2001 census recorded a population of 6,509 in the town.The nearest sizeable town to Southam is Leamington Spa, located roughly 7 miles to the west...
newspaperman who had briefly served as interim publisher a few years earlier.
The Post today
Since Izzy Asper's acquisition of the National Post, the paper has become a strong voice in support of the state of Israel and its government. The Post was one of the few Canadian papers to offer unreserved support to Israel during its conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon during 2006.One of its columnists referred to Hezbollah as "cockroaches." Canadian pundits argue whether the Posts support of Israel is a legacy of its late founder's political ideology or a shrewd business manoeuvre.
The Post during Ken Whyte's editorship was strongly associated with the personality of proprietor Conrad Black, just as the paper during Matthew Fraser's editorship was associated with Izzy Asper. Today the Post has to some extent abandoned this ideology that gave the Post a distinct voice and loyal readership. Many of its rival papers, meanwhile, have copied its unique design and layout features. In a national newspaper market considered too thin to sustain two products, the Post has struggled against the Globe and Mail, which has the advantages of a loyal readership and a history stretching back to the mid-19th century. The Posts entry into the Canadian newspaper market, while dazzling during its aggressively marketed start-up phase, was poorly timed because the entire newspaper sector was entering a period of structural decline, which continues today, as readers turn towards the Internet and other sources for information and distraction. The Post effectively abandoned its claim as a national newspaper in 2006 as print subscriptions were dropped in Atlantic Canada
Atlantic Canada
Atlantic Canada is the region of Canada comprising the four provinces located on the Atlantic coast, excluding Quebec: the three Maritime provinces – New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia – and Newfoundland and Labrador...
and then print editions were removed from all Atlantic Canadian newsstands except in Halifax as of 2007. The newspaper continued its erosion in 2008 with the announcement that weekday editions and home delivery would no longer be available in the provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan.
Politically, the Post has retained a conservative editorial stance under the Aspers' ownership, but has become markedly less strident. The Asper family has long been strong supporters of the Liberal Party of Canada
Liberal Party of Canada
The Liberal Party of Canada , colloquially known as the Grits, is the oldest federally registered party in Canada. In the conventional political spectrum, the party sits between the centre and the centre-left. Historically the Liberal Party has positioned itself to the left of the Conservative...
, though they have always had libertarian leanings. Izzy Asper was once leader of the Liberal Party in his home province of Manitoba
Manitoba
Manitoba is a Canadian prairie province with an area of . The province has over 110,000 lakes and has a largely continental climate because of its flat topography. Agriculture, mostly concentrated in the fertile southern and western parts of the province, is vital to the province's economy; other...
. The Aspers had controversially fired the publisher of the Ottawa Citizen
Ottawa Citizen
The Ottawa Citizen is an English-language daily newspaper owned by Postmedia Network in Ottawa, Canada. According to the Canadian Newspaper Association, the paper had a 2008 weekly circulation of 900,197.- History :...
, Russell Mills
Russell Mills
Russell Mills is a British artist who was born in Ripon, Yorkshire, UK in 1952. He paints, creates multimedia installations, designs stage sets and lighting and has produced record covers and book covers for Brian Eno, the Cocteau Twins,Michael Nyman, David Sylvian, Peter Gabriel, and Nine Inch...
, for calling for the resignation of Liberal prime minister Jean Chrétien
Jean Chrétien
Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien , known commonly as Jean Chrétien is a former Canadian politician who was the 20th Prime Minister of Canada. He served in the position for over ten years, from November 4, 1993 to December 12, 2003....
.
However, the Post endorsed the Conservative Party of Canada
Conservative Party of Canada
The Conservative Party of Canada , is a political party in Canada which was formed by the merger of the Canadian Alliance and the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada in 2003. It is positioned on the right of the Canadian political spectrum...
in the 2004 election
Canadian federal election, 2004
The Canadian federal election, 2004 , was held on June 28, 2004 to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 38th Parliament of Canada. The Liberal government of Prime Minister Paul Martin lost its majority, but was able to form a minority government after the elections...
when Fraser was editor. The Conservatives narrowly lost that election to the Liberals. After the election, the Post surprised many of its conservative readers by shifting its support to the victorious Liberal government of prime minister Paul Martin
Paul Martin
Paul Edgar Philippe Martin, PC , also known as Paul Martin, Jr. is a Canadian politician who was the 21st Prime Minister of Canada, as well as leader of the Liberal Party of Canada....
, and was highly critical of the Conservatives and their leader, Stephen Harper
Stephen Harper
Stephen Joseph Harper is the 22nd and current Prime Minister of Canada and leader of the Conservative Party. Harper became prime minister when his party formed a minority government after the 2006 federal election...
. The paper switched camps again in the runup to the 2006 election
Canadian federal election, 2006
The 2006 Canadian federal election was held on January 23, 2006, to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 39th Parliament of Canada. The Conservative Party of Canada won the greatest number of seats: 40.3% of seats, or 124 out of 308, up from 99 seats in 2004, and 36.3% of votes:...
(in which the Conservatives won a minority government). During the election campaign, David Asper appeared publicly several times to endorse the Conservatives.
The Post continues to lose money — around $9.3 million in the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, 2009. The Post's circulation declined by one third from 2007 to 2009.
Like its competitor The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail is a nationally distributed Canadian newspaper, based in Toronto and printed in six cities across the country. With a weekly readership of approximately 1 million, it is Canada's largest-circulation national newspaper and second-largest daily newspaper after the Toronto Star...
, the Post publishes a separate edition in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Canada's largest city and the fourth largest media centre in North America after New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
. The Toronto edition includes additional local content not published in the edition distributed to the rest of Canada, and is printed at the Toronto Star
Toronto Star
The Toronto Star is Canada's highest-circulation newspaper, based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Its print edition is distributed almost entirely within the province of Ontario...
presses in Vaughan
Vaughan, Ontario
Vaughan is a city in York Region north of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Vaughan is the fastest growing municipality in Canada achieving a population growth rate of 80.2% between 1996–2006, according to Statistics Canada having nearly doubled in population since 1991. Vaughan is located in Southern...
.
On September 27, 2007, the Post unveiled a major redesign of its appearance. Guided by Gayle Grin, the Post's managing editor of design and graphics, the redesign features a standardization in the size of typeface and the number of typefaces used, cleaner font for charts and graphs, and — perhaps the most striking portion of the redesign — the move of the nameplate banner from the top to the left side of Page 1 as well as each section's front page.
In 2009, the paper announced that as a temporary cost-cutting measure, it will not print a Monday edition from July to September 2009. On October 29, 2009, Canwest Global announced that due to a lack of funding, The National Post might close down as of October 30, 2009, subject to moving the paper to a new holding company. Late on October 29, 2009 Ontario Superior Court Justice Sarah Pepall ruled in Canwest's favour and allowed the paper to move into a holding company.
Investment bankers hired by CanWest received no offers when they tried to sell the National Post earlier this year. Without a buyer closing the paper was studied, but the costs were greater than gains from liquidating assets. The lawyer for CanWest, in arguing to Justice Pepall, said the National Post added value to other papers in the CanWest chain.
2006 Iran Controversy
On May 19, 2006, the newspaper ran two pieces alleging that the Iranian parliament had passed a law requiring religious minorities to wear special identifying badges. One piece was a front page news item titled "IRAN EYES BADGES FOR JEWS" accompanied by a 1935 picture of two Jews bearing Nazi-ordered yellow badge
Yellow badge
The yellow badge , also referred to as a Jewish badge, was a cloth patch that Jews were ordered to sew on their outer garments in order to mark them as Jews in public. It is intended to be a badge of shame associated with antisemitism...
s. Later on the same day, experts began coming forward to deny the accuracy of the Post story. The story proved to be false, but not before it had been picked up by a variety of other news media and generated comment from world leaders. Comments on the story by the Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper
Stephen Harper
Stephen Joseph Harper is the 22nd and current Prime Minister of Canada and leader of the Conservative Party. Harper became prime minister when his party formed a minority government after the 2006 federal election...
caused Iran to summon Canada's ambassador to Tehran, Gordon E. Venner, for an explanation.
On May 24, 2006, the editor-in-chief of the newspaper, Doug Kelly, published an apology for the story on Page 2, admitting that it was false and the National Post had not exercised enough caution or checked enough sources.
Since 1998, the Canadian Islamic Congress
Canadian Islamic Congress
The Canadian Islamic Congress refers to itself as Canada's largest national non-profit and wholly independent Islamic organization without affiliation to any foreign group, body, or government and says it represents -- Sunni and Shi'a Muslims, men and women, youth and seniors...
has been actively monitoring media coverage for anti-Muslim or anti-Islam sentiment and has issued reports highlighting its findings. It has opposed the use of phrases such as "Islamic guerrillas," "Islamic insurgency" and "Muslim militants" saying that terms like "militant" or "terrorist" should be used without a religious association "since no religion teaches or endorses terrorism, militancy or extremism." The Congress has singled out the National Post, saying the paper "consistently is No. 1" as an anti-Islam media outlet.
Editors in chief
- Kenneth WhyteKenneth WhyteKenneth Whyte is a Canadian newspaper and magazine editor. He has been publisher of the weekly Maclean's newsmagazine since March 2005. He is also president of Rogers Publishing Limited....
, 1998–2003 - Matthew FraserMatthew Fraser (journalist)Matthew William Fraser is a British-Canadian journalist, academic, and author known for his writing about the media industries...
, 2003–2005 - Doug Kelly, 2005–2010
- Stephen Meurice 2010–
Current editorial positions
- Doug Kelly, Publisher
- Stephen Meurice, Editor-in-Chief
- Jonathan Harris, Executive Editor
- Anne-Marie Owens, Managing Editor, News
- Jonathan Kay, Managing Editor, Comment
- Benjamin Errett, Managing Editor, Features
- Grant Ellis, Managing Editor, Financial Post
- Gayle Grin, Managing Editor, Design and Graphics
- Terence CorcoranTerence CorcoranTerence "Terry" Dollard Corcoran is editor and columnist for the Financial Post section of the Toronto-based National Post.-Biography and works:...
, FP Editor - Diane FrancisDiane FrancisDiane Francis is a Canadian journalist, author, and editor-at-large for the National Post newspaper since 1998. She was previously the Editor of the Financial Post from 1991 to 1998, when it was taken over by the National Post and incorporated into it...
, FP Editor-at-large - Rob Roberts, National Editor
- Ron Wadden, Toronto Editor
- Michael Higgins, Foreign Editor
- Adam McDowell, News Features Editor
- Jo-Anne MacDonald, Night Editor
- Jim Bray, Sports Editor
- Jeff Wasserman, Photography and Multimedia Editor
- Maryam Siddiqi, Deputy Managing Editor, Features
- Barry Hertz, Arts & Life Editor
- Mark Medley, Books Editor
- Jessica Johnston, Travel Editor
Columnists
- Rex MurphyRex MurphyRex Murphy is a Canadian commentator and author, primarily on Canadian political and social matters.Murphy was born in Carbonear, Newfoundland, 105 kilometres west of St. John's and is the second of five children of Harry and Marie Murphy...
- David Akin
- Conrad BlackConrad BlackConrad Moffat Black, Baron Black of Crossharbour, OC, KCSG, PC is a Canadian-born member of the British House of Lords, and a historian, columnist and publisher, who was for a time the third largest newspaper magnate in the world. Lord Black controlled Hollinger International, Inc...
- Terence CorcoranTerence CorcoranTerence "Terry" Dollard Corcoran is editor and columnist for the Financial Post section of the Toronto-based National Post.-Biography and works:...
- Colby CoshColby CoshColby Cosh is a Canadian commentator, writer and editor of non-fiction, and blogger.-Life and career:Cosh was born in Edmonton, Alberta and grew up in Bon Accord, Alberta, north of Edmonton. He graduated from the University of Alberta in 1993, doing further study in European intellectual history...
- David FrumDavid FrumDavid J. Frum is a Canadian American journalist active in both the United States and Canadian political arenas. A former economic speechwriter for President George W. Bush, he is also the author of the first "insider" book about the Bush presidency...
- Robert Fulford
- Anthony Furey
- Lorne Gunter
- Jim HarrisJim HarrisJim Harris may refer to:* Jim Harris , American novelist, author of A Bottle of Rain* Jim Harris , American children's book illustrator* Jim Harris , American naturalist...
- George JonasGeorge JonasGeorge Jonas is a Hungarian-born Canadian writer and columnist. He is the author of 15 books. They include Vengeance , the story of an Israeli operation to kill the terrorists responsible for the 1972 Munich massacre...
- Barbara KayBarbara KayBarbara Kay is a columnist with the National Post.Kay is a graduate of the University of Toronto where she earned an undergraduate degree in English literature...
- Ezra LevantEzra LevantEzra Isaac Levant is a Canadian lawyer, conservative political activist and media figure. He is the founder and former publisher of the Western Standard, hosts The Source daily on Sun News Network, and has written several books on politics....
- Don MartinDon Martin (journalist)Don Martin is a Canadian television and newspaper journalist, currently the host of Power Play on CTV News Channel. Formerly a political columnist for the National Post and the Calgary Herald, he joined the show in 2010 following the departure of Tom Clark.-References:...
- Kelly McParland
- John MooreJohn Moore- Clergy :*John Moore , British Scholar*John Moore , English Baptist minister from Northampton*John Moore , Archbishop of Canterbury, Privy Counsellor...
- Chris Selley
- Lawrence SolomonLawrence SolomonLawrence Solomon is a Canadian writer on the environment and the founder and executive director of Energy Probe, a Canadian non-governmental environmental organization...
- Amir TaheriAmir TaheriAmir Taheri is an Iranian-born conservative author based in Europe. His writings focus on the Middle East affairs and topics related to Islamist terrorism. He gained international fame as the man behind the 2006 Iranian sumptuary law controversy.-Career:Taheri's biography at Benador Associates...
- Fr. Raymond J. de SouzaRaymond J. de SouzaFather Raymond J. de Souza is a columnist for the National Post newspaper and the parish priest of Sacred Heart of Mary Parish on Wolfe Island, Ontario, Canada. He is the current Roman Catholic chaplain at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, and is also chaplain of the Queen’s football team...
See also
- Media in CanadaMedia in CanadaCanada has a well-developed media sector, but its cultural output — particularly in English films, television shows, and magazines — is often overshadowed by imports from the United States. Television, magazines, and newspapers are primarily for-profit corporations based on advertising,...
- List of Canadian newspapers
- List of the largest Canadian newspapers by circulation