Canadian Press

Canadian Press

Canadian Press (CP), Canada's principal news agency, began in 1910 as Canadian Press Ltd, a re-distributor of news from the Associated Press (AP) to Canadian newspapers through Morse code and telegraph wires. The Canadian Press was established in 1917 in order to bring news back from Canadian troops in World War I. French language service was inaugurated in 1951.

CP launched radio broadcast news services in 1954, audio services in the 1960s, and network newscasts in 1979. The news agency began using the Internet to deliver reports in English in 1997 and added French-language Internet service one year later. In 2009, CP launched Pagemasters North America to provide editorial production services like copy editing and layout design to newspapers across US and Canada. The Pagemasters model has been used in Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom and is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Australian Associated Press.

CP is a membership-based co-operative owned by the majority of daily newspapers in the country. The Canadian Press Member Exchange is the content on the CP news wires supplied by member newspapers. In a typical year, more than 20 000 stories are sent to CP from member newspapers.

CP has bureaus and correspondents in every major city in Canada, with access to news from over 100 daily newspapers and 500 radio and television channels across the country. Its head office is in Toronto, with a bureau in Washington, DC. Most international copy comes from two agencies: Associated Press (US) and Reuters (England).