WELLINGTON, New Zealand – Google on Friday threatened that their search engine would not be available in Australia if the government went ahead with plans to force tech giants to pay for news content.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison went back quickly, saying “we will not respond to threats. ”
“Australia makes our rules for what you can do in Australia,” Morrison told reporters in Brisbane. “It is done in our Parliament. It is made by our government. And that’s how things work here in Australia. ”
Morrison’s comments came after Mel Silva, managing director of Google Australia and New Zealand, told a Senate inquiry into the bill that the new rules would not work.
“If this version of the code were to become law, it would give us no real choice but to stop Google search in Australia,” Silva told seniors. “And that would be a bad outcome not only for us, but also for the people of Australia, the diversity of the media, and the small businesses that use our products every day. ”
The mandatory code of conduct proposed by the government aims to make GOOGL Alphabet,
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Google and Facebook FB,
Australian media companies pay fairly for the use of news content they siphon from news sites.
Silva said they were willing to pay a wide group of news publishers for the value they added, but not under the rules as proposed, which included payments for links and cookies .
She said the code’s “bias settlement model” also posed financial and operational risks to Google. She suggested a series of tweaks to the bill.
“We feel there is a possible way forward,” Silva said.
As in many other countries, Google controls web searches in Australia. Silva told seniors that 95% of searches in the country are done through Google.
Asked by one grandfather what level of tax he will pay, Silva said last year he paid about 59 million Australian dollars ($ 46 million) on AU $ 4.8 billion ($ 3.7 billion) in revenue.
Facebook is also violating the rules and has threatened to remove news stories from its site in Australia. Simon Milner, Facebook’s vice president, said the number of contracts he would have to strike would be unworkable.
The Australian Institute, an independent think tank, said lawyers should take a strong stand against Google bullying.
“Google’s evidence today is part of a chilling pattern of threatening behavior that is cool to anyone who values our democracy,” said Peter Lewis, director of the institute’s Center for Responsible Technology.