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Providing Content in Canada's Official Languages
Please note that the Official Languages Act requires that government publications be available in both official languages.
In order to meet some of the requirements under this Act, the Commission's transcripts will therefore be bilingual as to their covers, the listing of CRTC members and staff attending the hearings, and the table of contents.
However, the aforementioned publication is the recorded verbatim transcript and, as such, is transcribed in either of the official languages, depending on the language spoken by the participant at the hearing.
TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS
FOR THE CANADIAN RADIO-TELEVISION AND
TELECOMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION
TRANSCRIPTION DES AUDIENCES DU
CONSEIL DE LA RADIODIFFUSION
ET DES TÉLÉCOMMUNICATIONS CANADIENNES
SUBJECT / SUJET:
REGIONAL PUBLIC CONSULTATION ON THE
CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION (CBC) /
CONSULTATIONS PUBLIQUES SUR LA
SOCIÉTÉ RADIO-CANADA (SRC)
HELD AT: TENUE À:
Drayton Room Salle Drayton
The Coast Edmonton Hôtel Coast
Plaza Hotel Edmonton Plaza
10155 - 105 Street 10155 - 105 Street
Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton (Alberta)
March 18, 1999 Le 18 mars 1999
tel: 613-521-0703 StenoTran fax: 613-521-7668
Transcripts
In order to meet the requirements of the Official Languages
Act, transcripts of proceedings before the Commission will be
bilingual as to their covers, the listing of the CRTC members
and staff attending the public hearings, and the Table of
Contents.
However, the aforementioned publication is the recorded
verbatim transcript and, as such, is taped and transcribed in
either of the official languages, depending on the language
spoken by the participant at the public hearing.
Transcription
Afin de rencontrer les exigences de la Loi sur les langues
officielles, les procès-verbaux pour le Conseil seront
bilingues en ce qui a trait à la page couverture, la liste des
membres et du personnel du CRTC participant à l'audience
publique ainsi que la table des matières.
Toutefois, la publication susmentionnée est un compte rendu
textuel des délibérations et, en tant que tel, est enregistrée
et transcrite dans l'une ou l'autre des deux langues
officielles, compte tenu de la langue utilisée par le
participant à l'audience publique.
StenoTran
Canadian Radio-television and
Telecommunications Commission
Conseil de la radiodiffusion et des
télécommunications canadiennes
Transcript / Transcription
Public Hearing / Audience publique
REGIONAL PUBLIC CONSULTATION ON THE
CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION (CBC) /
CONSULTATIONS PUBLIQUES SUR LA
SOCIÉTÉ RADIO-CANADA (SRC)
BEFORE / DEVANT:
Cindy Grauer Chairperson / Présidente
ALSO PRESENT / AUSSI PRÉSENTS:
Carolyn Pinsky Commission Counsel /
Avocate du Conseil
Michelle Edge Western and Territories
Regional Office / Bureau
régional, Ouest du Canada
et Territoires
HELD AT: TENUE À:
Drayton Room Salle Drayton
The Coast Edmonton Hôtel Coast
Plaza Hotel Edmonton Plaza
10155 - 105 Street 10155 - 105 Street
Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton (Alberta)
March 18, 1999 Le 18 mars 1999
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TABLE OF CONTENTS / TABLE DES MATIÈRES
PAGE
Presentation by / Présentation par:
Hon. Charles Dent 5
Mr. Dave Jones 12
Ms Audrea Wulf 16
Ms Ruth McCullough 19
Mr. Eric Blanchette 25
Mr. Brian Lendrum 28
Mr. Peter Copyright 32
Mr. Larry Bagnell 37
Mr. Larry Bagnell 44
(Association of Yukon Communities)
Ms Kathy Watson 51
Mr. John Irving 64
Ms Barbara Drury 67
Ms Jennifer Nesbitt-Dufor 69
Ms Gail Noble 73
Mr. Brad Heath 79
Mr. Bill Powless 83
Mr. Ben McDonald 91
Mr. John Bayly 99
M. Maurice Morin 109
Ms Dawn Green-Shelton 116
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TABLE OF CONTENTS / TABLE DES MATIÈRES
PAGE
Presentation by / Présentation par:
M. Alain François 118
Ms Caroline Nielsen 120
M. Yves Caron 121
Ms Alison Dinwoodie 125
Ms Hazel Wilson 132
Mme Louisette Villeneuve 135
Mr. David Balcon 140
Ms Lynn Rubizna 145
Mr. Nicholas Spillios 159
La soeur Ida LaFrance 167
Mr. Walter Doskoch 171
Mr. Samuel King 175
Ms Erica Bullwinkle 182
Mr. Jim Borgel 188
Mr. Samuel Abernathy 192
Mr. Bill Lock 195
Ms Katherine Weinmann 200
Mr. Webb Dussome 203
Mme Patricia Rijavec 208
Ms Jenny Frost 212
Mr. Ned Toole 220
Ms Michelle Wilson 223
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TABLE OF CONTENTS / TABLE DES MATIÈRES
PAGE
Presentation by / Présentation par:
Mr. Randy Boissonnault 230
Ms Nicollete Saina 243
Ms Valerie Warke 256
Ms Joan Kneshe 262
Ms Marilyn Wall 264
Reply by: / Réplique par:
Ms Marie Wilson 105
Mr. Rene Fontaine 152
Mr. Don Orchard 237
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1 Edmonton, Alberta / Edmonton (Alberta)
2 --- Upon commencing on Thursday, March 18, 1999
3 at 1320 / L'audience reprend le jeudi
4 18 mars 1999, à 1320
5 1 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good day, ladies
6 and gentlemen, and welcome to this public consultation
7 on the CBC. My name is Cindy Grauer and I am a CRTC
8 Commissioner.
9 2 We are here to gather your views and
10 comments on CBC radio and television: In your opinion,
11 how should the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation fulfil
12 its role in the coming years?
13 3 Radio-Canada est un service public
14 national qui diffuse en français comme en anglais. Il
15 joue un rôle important dans l'ensemble du système de
16 radiodiffusion canadienne. Aujourd'hui de nombreux
17 éléments s'ajoutent continuellement au système à cause
18 de nouvelles technologies qui se multiplient,
19 convergent, ouvrent de nouveaux horizons et offrent de
20 plus en plus de nouveaux services.
21 4 Given that, it is very important that
22 the Commission hears what you have to say. We must not
23 lose sight of the fact that the CRTC is a public
24 organization that serves Canadian citizens. In this
25 capacity, we are responsible to you.
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1 5 This is why my fellow Commissioners
2 and myself find it vital to come and meet with you to
3 discuss these issues and why we are holding this series
4 of regional consultations from one end of the country
5 to the other, in 11 Canadian cities, from March 9th to
6 18th.
7 6 Elle vous donne l'occasion de nous
8 faire part de nos opinions sur le rôle de Radio-Canada,
9 le genre d'émissions qu'ils vous proposent et
10 l'orientation qu'ils devraient se donner à la veille du
11 nouveau millénaire aussi bien à l'échelle nationale
12 qu'aux échelles régionales et locales.
13 7 Through these consultations we hope
14 to enter into an open dialogue with you and hear your
15 concerns. Your comments will form part of the public
16 record, which will be added to the record of the public
17 hearing on the CBC that will begin in Hull next May
18 25th.
19 8 At this upcoming hearing the
20 Commission will examine the CBC's application for the
21 renewal of its licences, including radio, television
22 and its specialty services Newsworld and Réseau des
23 Informations.
24 9 You can also take part in that public
25 hearing by sending your written comments to the CRTC.
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1 If you wish to do so, please remember to refer to the
2 specific licence renewals being examined when you file
3 your comments.
4 10 I would like to come back to today's
5 consultations.
6 11 Please allow me to introduce the CRTC
7 staff who will be assisting us today: Caroline Pinsky,
8 our legal counsel; and Michelle Edge, from our Western
9 and Territories Regional Office.
10 12 Please feel free to call on them with
11 any questions you might have about the process today or
12 any other matter.
13 13 So that you will all have the
14 opportunity to speak, we ask that you please limit your
15 presentations to ten minutes. As these consultations
16 are a forum designed specifically for you, and we will
17 want to listen to as many participants as possible, we
18 will not ask any questions unless we need
19 clarification.
20 14 At the end of the session,
21 representatives from the local CBC stations will have a
22 chance to offer their views, as they are naturally very
23 interested in the issues we are discussing here today.
24 15 Before we start, I will ask our legal
25 counsel to go over some housekeeping matters regarding
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1 the conduct of this consultation.
2 16 MS PINSKY: Thank you. I would just
3 like to set out a couple of procedural matters.
4 17 In terms of how we will organize the
5 session this afternoon, first we will be speaking with
6 all of the presenters through our conference call in
7 Yellowknife, Inuvik and Whitehorse, and then we will
8 call upon the presenters here in Edmonton.
9 18 When we do that, the presenters here
10 in the hotel can take a seat around the table,
11 hopefully to create more of an informal atmosphere. I
12 will call in turn on each presenter to make his or her
13 ten-minute presentation.
14 19 When you are called upon, if you
15 could press the button on the microphone so that the
16 presentation is accurately transcribed, that will
17 assist matters.
18 20 We have translation services
19 available here today, so if anybody should require a
20 translation device you can obtain one at the desk at
21 the entrance of the room.
22 21 In addition, for those who are here
23 today but don't wish to make oral presentations, we do
24 have comment sheets available at the front desk. You
25 can put your comments in writing and they will be
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1 placed on the public record of this process.
2 22 I would call upon the first presenter
3 in Yellowknife.
4 23 I will just clarify, before we hear
5 from the first presenter, that once we conclude all the
6 presenters on the conference call, then we will give
7 the CBC an opportunity to respond to those
8 presentations as the line, I believe, will be cut at
9 that point.
10 24 I remind those on the call that
11 except when you are making your presentation, keep the
12 line on mute so that we don't get too much background
13 noise.
14 25 I will now call upon the first
15 presenter in Yellowknife, the Hon. Charles Dent.
16 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
17 26 HON. MR. DENT: Good afternoon.
18 27 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good afternoon.
19 28 HON. MR. DENT: I appreciate the
20 opportunity to appear today to comment on the future of
21 the CBC. The CBC is an important element of the
22 North's communication system, providing programming in
23 English and aboriginal language to the people of the
24 Northwest Territories.
25 29 For many years, CBC radio has been
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1 the source of news, information, ideas and, on a number
2 of occasions, an emergency broadcaster during times of
3 great need.
4 30 CBC North also fulfils an important
5 role in the north as an aboriginal language
6 broadcaster. They jumped into the field early and
7 deserve a great deal of credit for the work they have
8 done as aboriginal language broadcasters, both in radio
9 and in television.
10 31 In many communities, the CBC offered
11 northerners their first opportunity to hear information
12 about their region and the world in their own language.
13 In many of our communities, especially the smaller
14 ones, a significant number of people are unilingual,
15 speaking only their aboriginal language.
16 32 The programming of CBC Northern
17 Service is a valuable regional service, particularly
18 for people living in our isolated communities. Like
19 most government funded agencies, the government has
20 been faced with considerable financial pressure over
21 the past few years. These pressures have resulted in a
22 diminishing of programming and a neglect of service to
23 many of Canada's isolated areas.
24 33 Over the past year, the Government of
25 the Northwest Territories has written to the President
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1 of the CBC, the Minister of Canadian Heritage, the
2 CRTC, and has met with senior management of CBC
3 Northern Service to raise the issue of inadequate
4 service by the national public broadcasters.
5 34 That issue is the lack of regular CBC
6 service to almost half the communities in the Northwest
7 Territories. Twenty-nine already isolated and
8 undeserved communities in the Northwest Territories do
9 not have CBC owned, received and rebroadcast
10 facilities. This situation has occurred because CBC
11 does not service communities with a population of less
12 than 500 people.
13 35 I am pleased to say I received a
14 letter from Mr. Perrin Beatty earlier this week. He
15 advised us that, upon review of the current population
16 of our communities, CBC is prepared to assume
17 responsibility for upgrading the transmitter facilities
18 and their ongoing operation and maintenance in ten
19 additional communities.
20 36 We do appreciate this commitment by
21 the corporation, given the financial constraints under
22 which they are operating. Nonetheless, I suggest there
23 is still a need to examine policies within CBC
24 regarding distribution.
25 37 As things stand, the same communities
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1 that are least likely to be served by commercial
2 alternatives to CBC are also deemed least deserving of
3 receiving the national public broadcasting service.
4 Commercial broadcasters, in order to survive, obviously
5 must direct their program delivery to areas of
6 concentrated population. For the CBC also to
7 concentrate all of its distribution efforts in these
8 usually well-served markets at the expense of the
9 residents of small, virtually unserved communities,
10 leaves a significant portion of the Canadian public out
11 of reach of the national broadcaster.
12 38 I would suggest that rather than
13 simply competing for the larger urban markets, CBC's
14 role should require provision of service to people in
15 very small communities across Canada, who will likely
16 never receive a signal from commercial broadcasters who
17 must derive all of their operating budgets directly
18 from the marketplace.
19 39 In the late 1970s until early 1996,
20 the Government of the Northwest Territories was able to
21 alleviate the significant shortfall in CBC's service in
22 the Northwest Territories by installing and maintaining
23 moderately priced satellite received and rebroadcast
24 facilities in the previously noted 29 unserved
25 communities.
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1 40 Severe cuts in our federal transfers
2 have necessitated a re-evaluation of all Government of
3 the Northwest Territories' programs. We have had to
4 conclude that subsidizing operations of the
5 federally-funded national broadcaster was no longer
6 possible or reasonable.
7 41 The received rebroadcast equipment we
8 installed in the communities is still in place, but
9 without regular preventative maintenance the incidence
10 of breakdowns is increasing.
11 42 As an alternative to simply
12 abandoning an effective, inexpensive and established
13 means of ensuring equitable access to CBC programming
14 in all communities, our government believes that CBC,
15 as the national public broadcaster, should provide CBC
16 North with the means and the responsibility to maintain
17 service for all residents of the Northwest Territories.
18 43 We ask that the CBC take whatever
19 action is necessary to ensure that people in the small
20 remote communities which are dispersed across the NWT
21 continue to receive the CBC service they rely on so
22 heavily.
23 44 Mr. Beatty tells me that the CBC
24 recognizes the need to provide the citizens of the
25 Northwest Territories with a strong public broadcasting
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1 service at appropriate service levels. I suggest an
2 appropriate level of service would include all
3 communities with the regular power supply needed to
4 operate receivers and transmitters.
5 45 As things stand, current signal
6 distribution policies and budget allocations within CBC
7 do not allow CBC North to adequately fulfil its role as
8 either a national or regional public broadcaster.
9 46 CBC and CBC North are important
10 services. For many people in small isolated
11 communities these services provide the only means for
12 same day information and access to news about the
13 North, Canada and the world. Without regular access to
14 such services, Canadians living in isolation are
15 severely disadvantaged.
16 47 In considering the licence extension,
17 I would urge the members of the CRTC to consider the
18 importance of CBC radio as a national service and
19 direct the corporation to adequately service the
20 smallest communities in isolated areas of Canada.
21 48 Thank you.
22 49 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
23 Mr. Dent. I actually have one question of
24 clarification -- although it is a bit complex.
25 50 There are a number of communities
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1 which do not have service. What is the reason for
2 that?
3 51 HON. MR. DENT: There are a number of
4 communities in the Northwest Territories that are not
5 served by CBC through their own equipment, in terms of
6 receiving satellite signal then rebroadcasting on air,
7 because the population in those communities is less
8 than 500.
9 52 The CBC's mandate right now is to
10 service communities with a population greater than 500.
11 53 In 29 communities that the CBC
12 initially did not provide service, the Government of
13 Northwest Territories installed satellite receiver
14 equipment and rebroadcast equipment, which we have
15 turned over to the communities. The CBC signal can be
16 heard on that from those broadcasters.
17 54 We don't have the money to maintain
18 those facilities any more. The CBC has agreed to take
19 on an additional ten, but that still leaves 19
20 communities throughout Nunavut and the Northwest
21 Territories where it is up to the communities now to
22 look after the maintenance of the equipment.
23 55 THE CHAIRPERSON: I see; thank you
24 very much.
25 56 And thank you very much for joining
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1 us today. I appreciate your taking the time.
2 57 HON. MR. DENT: My pleasure.
3 58 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
4 1330
5 59 MS PINSKY: I will now turn to
6 Inuvik. Mr. Dave Jones is the first presenter there.
7 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
8 60 MR. JONES: Hi. How are you?
9 61 THE CHAIRPERSON: Very well.
10 62 MR. JONES: Unfortunately, you were
11 breaking up quite a bit during your introduction, but I
12 will assume that my presentation will be fine as I give
13 it.
14 63 I am in my mid-thirties. I am
15 university-educated. For the past five years I have
16 lived in Inuvik. Inuvik is a mostly aboriginal
17 community, with a large non-aboriginal professional
18 workforce.
19 64 I have always, as with most
20 Canadians, had CBC in my life -- CBC radio or TV --
21 although I must confess that I have never owned a TV
22 personally. It goes without saying that I am a devout
23 CBC supporter.
24 65 As a result of living in the north
25 over the past five years and never having owned a TV, I
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1 am a little out of touch with the current state of
2 affairs with CBC in the south or how it has changed. I
3 make the distinction between the south and the north,
4 because it seems that all the decisions on the shape of
5 CBC are made in the south.
6 66 I know that the south is in a
7 constant state of consumer bombardment; that there are
8 this seemingly infinite number of choices. This
9 includes, of course, choices for radio and television
10 stations. This has obviously put stress on the CBC and
11 on the affected politicians in their search for ways to
12 react to the consumer.
13 67 That is the problem. CBC listeners
14 are not consumers; they are Canadians -- Canadians who
15 want to hear from other Canadians about Canada and
16 about the rest of the world. They want to hear stories
17 from the Canadian perspective. They want to watch
18 programs that reflect the Canadian way of seeing
19 things. They are Canadians that want to be part of a
20 country that is alive with people, not consumers.
21 68 I am getting tired of watching and
22 listening to the degradation of the CBC over the past
23 couple of years. The policy people in charge of how
24 the CBC is run are wearing me out. If the long-term
25 plan is to dismantle the CBC, which is what it seems
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1 like sometimes, then I wish they would just do it and
2 get it over with. It hurts more to take the bandage
3 off slowly rather than just rip it off.
4 69 However, if there are really efforts
5 in the works to make CBC a better service for
6 Canadians -- and I truly hope that this is the case --
7 I would like to offer my suggestions.
8 70 For example, I would offer some
9 specifics, such as keeping advertising out of radio and
10 reducing the advertising on television. Put
11 Canadian-made films on television, unedited and
12 uncensored. I think I might even buy a TV set if for
13 one night a week I can watch a really good movie
14 without the heart cut out of it.
15 71 And give professional sports to the
16 other networks. What I would like to watch, when I
17 watch TV, is amateur sporting events.
18 72 I could go on and on about the
19 specific add-ons and subtractions from the current
20 programming, but that is not my point for being here.
21 What I would like to see from CBC in the future is a
22 real commitment to two things:
23 73 First, keep doing all the good things
24 that CBC is doing, only double the volume. We all know
25 what these things are, because we talk about them all
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1 the time. We all have our favourite programs.
2 74 Second, don't sacrifice on the
3 quality of programming or on the presentation. Look
4 for and keep the best journalists, technicians, hosts,
5 et cetera. I use, for example, here in the north that
6 the quality of regional and local radio programming and
7 staff has deteriorated for the most part over the last
8 couple of years. I hope that those in charge will
9 recognize this and begin to make some changes for the
10 better.
11 75 Overall, I think it is time for some
12 bold changes at the CBC. The CBC does not have to
13 compete against other networks if they are the ones
14 setting the trend. I feel it is the role of the CBC,
15 and should only be the role of the CBC, to satisfy the
16 hunger of Canadians to keep in touch with each other.
17 This should only be done with pride, dignity and
18 intelligence.
19 76 Thanks.
20 77 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
21 Mr. Jones.
22 1335
23 78 MS PINSKY: The next presenter from
24 Inuvik is Ms Audrea Wulf.
25 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
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1 79 MS WULF: Hello.
2 80 THE CHAIRPERSON: Hello, Ms Wulf.
3 81 MS WULF: First of all, thank you for
4 allowing me to state my piece here. I am a faithful
5 CBC listener. I have always been and probably always
6 will be. As a little girl growing up in Tuktoyaktuk,
7 my family and I would often sit around the box and
8 listen to the hockey games and the speeches, et cetera.
9 82 I was born in Stanton, a trading post
10 that doesn't exist any more. I have lived in the
11 Western Arctic for many years and have also lived and
12 travelled across Canada. What I am trying to say is
13 that I have been exposed to the outside, as we call it
14 here.
15 83 CBC means something to me because I
16 know CBC means Canadian. It represents the different
17 flavours and cultures that make up this country.
18 84 I am here today because I feel this
19 really isn't happening any more in the Mackenzie Delta.
20 I feel like the CBC is fading out, and just about any
21 old radio will do these days. Maybe it is because we
22 are on the outskirts of the CBC North headquarters.
23 Whatever the reason, it probably has to do with money.
24 85 The Beaufort Delta is not being
25 represented on CBC North TV or the radio. Yes, I am
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1 aware you have an office here in Inuvik, but the
2 headquarters in Yellowknife is not listening. If it
3 was, it would realize that some people's stories are
4 not being told. The Inuvialuit and Gwich'in stories
5 are not being told.
6 86 On the TV you have a host who very
7 rudely talks in his personal language for about two or
8 three minutes at the end of the show. How do others
9 feel when there is no translation or thought about
10 leaving others out?
11 87 On CBC North Beat it is strictly
12 Indian. During the Christmas season a huge teepee was
13 set up with an Indian type Virgin Mary and child. This
14 silent picture was flashed often. The very start of
15 North Beat show is filled with Indian pictures and
16 customs. The CBC radio announcers cannot even
17 pronounce Inuvaluit names.
18 88 During the Nunavut election,
19 announcers from CBC Iqaluit would transfer back to the
20 host of CBC North only to be greeted with a Dene "thank
21 you", very loudly and clearly, in case someone thought
22 the Dene were being left out.
23 89 These may seem like small
24 insignificant and petty stories. I am worried about
25 the North and I feel the CBC is helping an atmosphere
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1 of disharmony and loss of respect for one another.
2 This problem is a very subtle one that I am speaking
3 about, but I feel it is a very powerful one. After
4 all, that's what we remember: the impressions. After
5 the TV picture is gone, the impressions are left with
6 us in our minds.
7 90 Please understand me. I am 47 years
8 old, and I am no longer interested in games or immature
9 useless actions. I am interested in seeing people, no
10 matter who they are, to be proud and happy of who they
11 are and what they are.
12 91 To me, the Inuvialuit have a history
13 of being put down. The present media isn't helping.
14 Please make some considerations into hiring an
15 Inuvialuit host for sharing a spot on CBC North Beat.
16 Our language is trying to make a comeback. This would
17 help.
18 92 Some stories from the Western Arctic,
19 the Mackenzie Delta would be a start. If you have
20 announcers here in Inuvik and still the stories of the
21 Delta are not being told, that's because the boss in
22 Yellowknife isn't listening to hear if there are other
23 stories from all over the North being represented
24 through them.
25 93 There seems to be a complacency.
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1 94 Thank you very much.
2 --- Foreign language / Langue étrangère
3 95 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
4 much, Ms Wulf.
5 1341
6 96 MS PINSKY: We will hear now from
7 Whitehorse. The first presenter in Whitehorse is Ms
8 Ruth McCullough.
9 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
10 97 MS McCULLOUGH: Can you hear me?
11 98 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes, we can.
12 99 MS McCULLOUGH: First of all, thank
13 you very much for allowing me to have some comments on
14 my only window to the outside world. Where I live, I
15 am in a dead spot; therefore, I cannot receive CBC
16 television or any other kind of television. So the
17 radio is my lifeline.
18 100 I am going to organize my comments in
19 order of the four questions that were provided to me on
20 a press release. I will begin with the first one:
21 "In your view, how well does the
22 CBC fulfil its role as the
23 national public broadcaster?"
24 101 To fulfil a role as the national
25 public broadcaster, the CBC must provide equal service
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1 to all areas of the country. This means that all
2 services presently available to one area of the country
3 must be available to all others, such as FM services.
4 Presently, there is no CBC FM service in the Yukon. If
5 the CBC wishes to be truly considered national, these
6 services must be provided nationally.
7 102 The North and many other parts of
8 Canada have people who are enthusiastic CBC listeners.
9 In the new millennium, rather than spending exorbitant
10 amounts of money on trying to attract new listeners or
11 viewers or spreading the limited dollars available to
12 the CBC into new technical areas or additional radio or
13 TV stations, the CBC should do its best to maintain the
14 interest and loyalty of those people who are already
15 sold on the product being provided.
16 103 In my opinion, CBC is presently
17 putting all of its resources into the region of
18 greatest population, considering additional services in
19 those areas in hopes that new subscribers can be
20 attracted. The CBC should recognize that they are
21 completely incapable of competing against the large
22 private corporations with mega dollars at their
23 disposal through the sale of advertising. Therefore,
24 they should be spending their limited resources on
25 ensuring that the product they presently produce is the
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1 very best possible.
2 104 I would like to support Mr. Dent and
3 the NWT by saying that it is more important for the CBC
4 to service the North, where communication is so much
5 more difficult and limited, than in the South where
6 there is a tremendous variety of media outlets.
7 105 The second question is:
8 "How well does the CBC serve the
9 public on a regional as well as
10 a national level?"
11 106 CBC should recognize that the North
12 is not one region. It has already been recognized that
13 the Northwest Territories is far too large to work as
14 one jurisdiction and has split it into the NWT and
15 Nunavut. You have no idea how frustrating it is when
16 residing in Whitehorse or other Yukon communities to
17 have to listen to community activities that are
18 happening in Tuk or Baffin Island, much less waiting
19 forever to find out what we can expect in the weather
20 department.
21 107 Think about the reaction that would
22 be received if all of the regional programming for
23 B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba was produced
24 out of Saskatoon.
25 108 Regional programming changes for the
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1 North are never discussed with the people who live
2 there. We used to get a wonderful classical music
3 program on Sunday mornings, from 6:00 to 9:00 a.m. Now
4 we get programming out of Yellowknife. On weekends our
5 weather reports are from Yellowknife, and they happen
6 to be the same report from morning until night.
7 109 The reception can be poor to
8 non-existent on weekends. But because we have no one
9 in our Whitehorse station, these problems are never
10 addressed. When I phoned the number to report a
11 problem about the reception, it was a Yellowknife phone
12 number. I got no response.
13 110 On February 29th we in Whitehorse
14 endured three hours of dead air. Perhaps because the
15 Yellowknife feed had not been turned on. The national
16 feed did provide the news on the hour. But from 6:00
17 a.m. to 9:00 a.m., there was no radio.
18 111 As well, the feed from Yellowknife
19 for two weeks in a row was so bad it sounded as if the
20 channel had not been properly tuned in.
21 --- Background noise / Bruit de fond
22 112 If there was staffing provided in our
23 Whitehorse station, this would not happen. And yes,
24 both of these problems occurred during the technicians'
25 strike. However, we don't have those kinds of problems
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1 Monday through Friday when the programming was handled
2 in Whitehorse, and the reception problem was equally
3 cleared up even though the technicians are not there to
4 work on it.
5 113 Before Christmas, when the
6 technicians were not on strike, on two occasions there
7 was a 20-minute and a 45-minute occurrence of dead air.
8 Once again, if regional programming for the Yukon was
9 provided through our Whitehorse radio station on the
10 weekends as well as during the week, these problems can
11 be addressed quickly.
12 114 No. 3:
13 "Should programming provided by
14 CBC radio and television be
15 different than that provided by
16 other broadcasters? If so, what
17 should those differences be?"
18 115 The programming provided by CBC radio
19 and TV must be different from other broadcasters, for
20 two reason:
21 116 One, it is an arm's length from
22 government body funded with public dollars and without
23 commercials. Therefore, its focus must be emphasizing
24 the state of the nation.
25 117 Two, CBC is the only national radio
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1 station and, as such, it is our link to other regions
2 of our country. It is the only avenue that we as
3 Canadians have to hear what is happening throughout our
4 country. It is our only mechanism to find out about
5 the traditions throughout our country.
6 118 C'est la Vie, Richardson's Round-up,
7 Definitely Not The Opera and Basic Black all provide
8 these vignettes from across the country. We need to
9 maintain them.
10 119 And no. 4:
11 "Is there a special role that
12 the CBC should play in the
13 presentation of Canadian
14 programming? If so, what should
15 this role be?
16 120 The CBC should be taking a lead role
17 in the promotion of Canada's creative community. This
18 means literary, musical, as well as production of
19 Canadian programming. There are few people in the
20 south of Canada who exclusively listen to or watch CBC,
21 as is more the case in the North. Regardless, CBC
22 should be the first avenue for all Canadians to
23 identify the who's who in Canadian culture.
24 121 I personally do not feel that the
25 promotion of Canadian talent will drive listeners and
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1 viewers away from CBC. I think it is time that we
2 realized and recognized that our talent base is every
3 bit as good as that of the USA's, and we should begin a
4 vigorous programming of promoting our talent and
5 ensuring support for them in Canada.
6 122 Thank you very much.
7 123 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
8 much.
9 124 I just want to ensure that that was
10 Ruth McCullough?
11 125 MS McCULLOUGH: Yes, it was.
12 126 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
13 much, Ms McCullough.
14 127 Le prochain intervenant est M. Henri
15 Blanchette.
16 PRESENTATION / PRESENTATION
17 128 MR. BLANCHETTE: I will give you some
18 time to get your little translation gadget, because I
19 am going to do my presentation in French.
20 129 THE CHAIRPERSON: We are ready for
21 that.
22 130 M. BLANCHETTE: Je suis très heureux
23 de représenter l'Association franco-yukonnaise à cette
24 audience publique du CRTC. En tant que francophones
25 hors Québec, nous considérons Radio-Canada comme une
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1 entité très importante au maintien et au développement
2 de la francophonie hors Québec.
3 131 A ce sujet, nous recevons
4 présentement les ondes de Radio-Canada Vancouver, de la
5 radio de Radio-Canada à Vancouver, et nous aurons, à
6 partir du 1er juin 1999, la télé par ondes hertzienne
7 aussi.
8 132 Cependant, quelques problèmes,
9 quelques lacunes semblent s'émisser dans la
10 programmation de Radio-Canada. On a énormément de
11 misère à avoir une couverture médiatique adéquate de ce
12 qui se passe au Yukon en français et en anglais et on a
13 des problèmes à recevoir cette couverture-là en
14 français évidemment.
15 133 Alors, en parlant avec le conseil
16 d'administration de l'Association franco-yukonnaise, on
17 en est venus à quelques propositions et nous voudrions
18 vous en parler et c'est mon collègue Marco Folia(ph)
19 qui remplace M. Yanéri qui va vous en parler à
20 l'instant.
21 134 M. MARCO FOLIA: Alors, premièrement
22 je voudrais dire bonjour à tout le monde et je voudrais
23 aussi remercier le CRTC de nous donner l'occasion de
24 faire entendre notre voix sur l'avenir de Radio-Canada.
25 135 Premièrement, mon nom est Marco
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1 Folia, je suis directeur du secteur communications au
2 sein du conseil d'administration de l'Association
3 franco-yukonnaise qui est porte-parole de tous les
4 francophones du Yukon.
5 136 Comme le disait M. Blanchette avant
6 moi, je vais vous parler un petit peu de solutions, de
7 certains des problèmes que nous éprouvons ici au niveau
8 de la couverture médiatique et peut-être vous inviter
9 aussi à proposer ou à suggérer des façons novatrices de
10 régler ces problèmes-là.
11 --- Difficultés techniques / Technical difficulties
12 137 J'aimerais, toutefois, souligner qu'à
13 mon avis -- ou de l'avis de l'Association
14 franco-yukonnaise plutôt -- dont je suis le
15 porte-parole aujourd'hui, un des rôles que la Société
16 Radio-Canada devrait prendre en charge serait de
17 promouvoir l'unité afin qu'on ait un sentiment
18 d'appartenance qui serve à unir le pays et non à
19 diviser les communautés linguistiques.
20 138 J'ai la chance de parler les deux
21 langues officielles et de les comprendre. Lorsqu'on
22 regarde la couverture médiatique francophone et on la
23 compare à la couverture médiatique anglophone il semble
24 y avoir une espèce de dualité entre les deux
25 couvertures, donc parmi les rôles que la Société --
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1 --- Difficultés techniques / Technical difficulties
2 139 Si vous avez des questions, soyez les
3 bienvenus, mais moi j'ai terminé. Vous allez recevoir
4 notre mémoire écrit pour mai.
5 140 LA PRÉSIDENTE: Merci beaucoup. Nous
6 n'avons pas de questions.
7 141 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is
8 Brian Lendrum.
9 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
10 142 MR. LENDRUM: Madam Commissioner, I
11 am speaking to you today after a rather heavy cold and
12 not a very good phone line, so I hope I will be able to
13 get my points across.
14 143 THE CHAIRPERSON: You sound clear.
15 144 MR. LENDRUM: I have some very simple
16 things to say about CBC Radio One, some very personal
17 things to say. I have nothing to say about CBC Radio
18 Two, because for most of my adult life I have lived in
19 areas where the FM signal simply doesn't reach. I have
20 nothing to say about CBC television for the same
21 reason, and also because it is essentially a visual
22 medium and I am blind.
23 145 For 25 years or so I have listened to
24 CBC Radio One virtually every day, and I don't know why
25 but never before today have I made the effort to let
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1 anyone know just what an important part of my life it
2 is. I can echo the view expressed several times
3 already today about the importance of CBC to people who
4 live in areas where it is truly the only choice.
5 146 I suspect that that may come as a
6 surprise to people in Toronto or Vancouver, or maybe
7 even Edmonton, to know that there are many places in
8 Canada where there simply is no choice. You listen to
9 CBC AM or you don't turn your radio on. Clearly, we
10 have heard today where there are also vast areas where
11 you can't even receive CBC AM. But I have never lived
12 there, so I will let those people speak for themselves.
13 147 For those of us who can receive CBC
14 AM and nothing else, it is essential that that service
15 remain and be reinforced. For those of who don't read,
16 whether it is because of dyslexia or whether it is
17 because we never learned, or whether it is because our
18 vision is not good enough, CBC is a truly vital source
19 of information.
20 148 I depend on CBC for the widest
21 possible variety of information: from local news to
22 general education, science, biography, literature,
23 finance, you name it. My needs are much broader than
24 the average listener, because I am looking to CBC to
25 fill the information gaps that result from my not being
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1 able to read.
2 149 That is perhaps an unfair
3 expectation. But it is fair, I think, to ask CBC to
4 bear in mind the non-reader when they are designing
5 their program schedule.
6 150 Please notice that my relationship
7 with CBC is totally apolitical. I feel that upper
8 echelons of CBC management, and certainly the
9 government, view CBC as an instrument for advancing one
10 political agenda or another. To me, questions of
11 politics are simply not important enough to warrant
12 such a large instrument.
13 151 What I need from CBC is information
14 on the broadest possible range of topics. And I
15 flatter myself that I have enough gumption to form my
16 own views on questions of politics.
17 152 I should comment a little on the
18 impact of recent cutbacks at CBC.
19 153 In my view, the national morning
20 program is lighter, less thoughtful than it used to be.
21 The afternoon program, The Round-up, is a very neat and
22 entertaining way of packaging repeat broadcasts. If
23 there wasn't so much other repeat broadcasting in the
24 course of a day, that would be great. I used to think,
25 in fact, that it was a shame that some excellent
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1 programs were aired only once and then relegated to the
2 archives. But now I would say that repeat broadcasting
3 has gone too far, to the extent that I find myself
4 turning the radio off.
5 154 This is especially true on the local
6 morning program where they sometimes even repeat an
7 interview in the course of the same three-hour program.
8 155 As for the evening programs, As It
9 Happens and Ideas remain excellent productions.
10 Whoever thought of replacing the overnight programming,
11 that used to be so dismal, with programs from Europe,
12 Africa and Australia, that was a really good move. I
13 hope they continue to do that.
14 156 The weekend programming I view as
15 essentially entertainment, and I have little to say
16 about that, except Vinyl Cafe, which is my personal
17 favourite -- a cut above everything else, I believe.
18 157 One further point. I mentioned that
19 at home CBC is my only choice. When I travel, I still
20 listen to CBC because I am not prepared to subject
21 myself to the barrage of advertising on other stations.
22 If anyone is thinking of introducing commercials to CBC
23 radio, I can say quite categorically that the day that
24 that begins is the day I turn my radio off.
25 158 And that is in spite of all I said
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1 earlier about how important, how essential CBC is to
2 me.
3 159 As a conclusion, when the Commission
4 is considering the relicensing of CBC, please remember
5 those of us for whom CBC AM -- and I stress the AM
6 part -- is the only choice. Remember those of us who
7 don't read and for whom radio is an essential source of
8 information.
9 160 If my taxes have to go up in order to
10 reverse the decrease in quality that we have
11 experienced over the past three or four years, then so
12 be it. But for goodness sake, don't allow advertising
13 on CBC Radio One.
14 161 Thank you.
15 162 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr.
16 Lendrum. I appreciate you sharing your views with us,
17 and I hope you are feeling better soon.
18 163 MR. LENDRUM: Thank you.
19 164 MS PINSKY: The next presenter in
20 Whitehorse is Mr. Peter Copyright.
21 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
22 165 MR. COPYRIGHT: Good afternoon. My
23 name is Peter Copyright. I have lived in Whitehorse
24 for almost the last three years. I am an artist,
25 manager, and booking agent, and I am an active
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1 supporter and faithful listener of the CBC and Société
2 Radio-Canada.
3 166 For me, the Canadian Broadcasting
4 Corporation and Société Radio-Canada speaks to my heart
5 and to my soul. The post information age in which we
6 live offers consumers of television, radio and culture
7 a vast and varied choice of creative sources.
8 Nowadays, people have almost too many choices and not
9 enough substance.
10 167 We are bombarded from all sides by
11 the 500-plus channel satellite TV, by talk-free
12 specialty digital cable radio stations, movies, video
13 games, the Internet, in addition to books, magazines,
14 visual arts, as well as the performing and recording
15 arts.
16 168 New technologies are changing the way
17 we consume culture. Music can now be downloaded and
18 burned on to a CD for free through the Internet,
19 regardless of the artist's publishing rights.
20 169 How can the CBC compete in this new
21 and ever evolving environment? For starters, it is
22 obvious that the CBC/SRC must change.
23 170 I would like to thank the organizers
24 of this teleconference for providing this opportunity
25 to Canadians to voice their thoughts on the future of
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1 the CBC/SRC before it is arbitrarily done away with by
2 the federal government.
3 171 I believe the CBC/SRC could become a
4 shining beacon of Canadian culture amid the vast
5 wasteland of mostly commercial and mostly American
6 entertainment. By broadcasting Canada's stories and
7 culture, the CBC/SRC may fulfil its mandate of
8 providing a national conscience and identity.
9 172 The CBC/SRC should showcase Canadian
10 culture in its many forms. It is the perfect vehicle
11 for Canadian artists to reach out to all of Canada with
12 their stories, their movies, television shows, music,
13 dance, theatre, visual arts and literature. Then the
14 CBC/SRC may fulfil its mandate of actively contributing
15 to cultural expression and to the exchange of the
16 diverse forms it can take.
17 173 In this age of specialty TV channels,
18 if I want to see a Formula One car race, for example, I
19 can tune into a sports channel. But if I want to see a
20 Canadian movie, a Celtic electric concert or Juste pour
21 Rires, where else can I tune into but the CBC/SRC?
22 174 Furthermore, the CBC/SRC is the only
23 medium in Canada where ordinary Canadians can voice
24 their opinions on a national level. Cross Country
25 Check-Up on Radio One is a good example of a show which
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1 binds the mosaic of distinct cultures that make up the
2 vast expanse of a country called Canada.
3 175 How else and where else can
4 Newfoundlanders, Yukoners, Acadians, First Nations
5 peoples, British Columbians, Quebeckers and other
6 Canadians from all walks of life talk to each other
7 about Canadian issues if not on the CBC/SRC?
8 176 This national public broadcaster is
9 the glue which may just hold this country together.
10 The CBC/SRC will not play this vital role if it is sold
11 off to the private sector or if the drastic cutbacks
12 continue or if it becomes a mouthpiece for the state.
13 177 The Canadian government should not
14 only halt the cutbacks to CBC/SRC, it should increase
15 funding to our national public broadcaster in order to
16 permit the production and broadcasting of Canadian
17 culture to all Canadians: north, south, east and west.
18 178 Otherwise, we as a country shall go
19 the way of the only other G-7 country which does not
20 have a national public broadcaster, that being the
21 United States of America.
22 179 Living here in Whitehorse, Yukon, I
23 deplore the fact that if I want to tune into Radio Two
24 or SRC television, I have to pay for basic cable. I
25 already pay for Radio Two and SRC television, which I
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1 consider essential services, with my taxes.
2 180 Also, I strongly recommend that SRC
3 television and CBC Radio Two -- that is to say, CBC
4 FM -- be made available on the Yukon airwaves, or at
5 least on the Whitehorse airwaves, so that all I need to
6 do to tune these stations in is have an antenna.
7 181 I am told that a precedent for this
8 has already been established in Yellowknife, another
9 small northern community where Radio Two is now
10 available thanks to the dedication of ordinary and
11 tireless people.
12 182 The weak signal strength of
13 Radio-Canada FM should be boosted, as it is often
14 difficult to tune into from downtown Whitehorse.
15 183 Another recommendation that I would
16 like to make is that the CBC/SRC television and radio
17 be broadcast internationally. This would increase the
18 visibility of Canadian artists and original Canadian
19 productions. It would also boost international tourism
20 to one of the greatest countries in the world -- that
21 is to say, Canada -- by showcasing what we have to
22 offer on the cultural level.
23 184 If the CBC/SRC is sold off to the
24 highest bidder or if it becomes just a mouthpiece for
25 the federal government propaganda, or if it is
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1 continuously whittled away by further funding cuts, we
2 as a country will take one step closer to losing our
3 cultural sovereignty to the American entertainment
4 giant to the south.
5 185 The CBC is the voice of Canada's
6 stories. Merci; thank you.
7 186 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr.
8 Copyright.
9 1410
10 187 MS PINSKY: The next presenter in
11 Whitehorse is Mr. Larry Bagnell.
12 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
13 188 MR. BAGNELL: Just before I start, we
14 have a technical matter here.
15 189 There are two people who said that
16 they registered and they are not on the list that we
17 were handed here in Whitehorse. I don't know if it is
18 different than the list that you might have.
19 190 The people's names are Jenny
20 Nesbitt-Dufor and Gail Noble.
21 191 Do you have them on your list? They
22 said they registered.
23 192 MS PINSKY: No, we don't. But that
24 is fine. Perhaps they can wait until the end of the
25 presenters from Whitehorse and then they can make their
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1 presentations following those who have registered.
2 193 MR. BAGNELL: Thank you.
3 194 I am on the next two times; the first
4 one is a personal time slot, and the second one is for
5 the Association of Yukon Communities. We thought we
6 would have someone else for that, but I will break in
7 between so that you know where the break is.
8 195 I am going to start as a personal
9 citizen. I was asked to appear, so I guess I will give
10 some comments here. I am going to mention a few
11 organizations in this presentation, but these are only
12 the ones that I am involved with. It is not their
13 opinions; it is just my opinions on the help that the
14 CBC has given to those organizations.
15 196 I will take a little different
16 approach to my presentation, as opposed to evaluating
17 each program and saying that it is good or bad, just to
18 give some criteria that I would hope and think that the
19 CRTC might use in evaluating programs.
20 197 I think, in general, any time you do
21 a zero-based budgeting exercise like this, the main
22 question is: Why is government needed to fund this
23 service? Wherever the service is needed, should
24 government do it like they do now or should they pay
25 the private sector to do it?
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1 198 As you evaluate each part and each
2 program, just determine why the government is involved
3 in this particular type of programming.
4 199 CBC, as any other government service,
5 should be provided, if it is not or cannot be provided
6 otherwise. And each CBC program should be analyzed
7 under this criteria.
8 200 As you analyze each one, I think it
9 has to be the ones that are essential for Canadians are
10 the ones that are given the priority and the funding to
11 make sure they exist. I am not sure in these tight
12 fiscal times if we can afford to have the things
13 government do, the nice to have things, or luxury or
14 pure untargeted and unfunded entertainment, or items
15 that are useful but optional. There are a lot of
16 essential things we need, and I think that is where the
17 priority has to be.
18 201 I will give some examples of some of
19 the essential things that I think have been very useful
20 in some of the areas that I have been involved in.
21 202 One is the president of (inaudible)
22 Indian Friendship Centre. There are 14 different First
23 Nation cultures in the Yukon, and the private sector
24 could not necessarily get the revenue to fund a good
25 description and ongoing display of those. I think that
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1 has been a great help in the Yukon.
2 203 I am also the president of the United
3 Way, and the CBC Yukon has been exceptionally helpful
4 in that area. Once again, it is a public service. It
5 is a social service that the private sector may not be
6 able to give as much time to. The CBC has given all
7 sorts of support. And not only that, the employees
8 themselves had a major celebration event and they
9 donated all the revenues to the United Way.
10 204 Also, as a previous person mentioned
11 about non-reading people, I am on the Yukon Learn Board
12 and the CBC does great work in promoting literacy,
13 which, once again, might not be able to be funded for a
14 private sector broadcaster to spend their time on that.
15 205 I am also on the Anti Poverty
16 Coalition, and the CBC very recently especially has
17 taken a great interest in poverty issues. There have
18 been a number of interviews with myself and other
19 people to try and get the message across to the public
20 what type of issues those are.
21 206 Once again, how could you fund such
22 in the private sector? It might be quite difficult.
23 207 I am also on the Yukon Science
24 Institute, which is very important for Canada in a
25 competitive world and could be hard to fund locally.
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1 The women do math exercises. The CBC again has been
2 great in promoting science and these types of things.
3 208 Also with the arts centre, the guild
4 hall and the railway, the CBC again is a great promoter
5 for a non-profit type. These are things that, in the
6 large scale of things, could not be funded to the
7 extent they are locally. And of course the French
8 culture which you heard a lot about lately.
9 209 Also, as chair of the Robert Service
10 Society, the biggest selling poet in history, if
11 England takes advantage of Shakespeare, Canada has to
12 take more advantage of that poet. CBC Yukon has been
13 excellent in that event. In fact, they had a show on
14 him this morning again. They have done a great service
15 to Canada in that respect.
16 210 On specialty programs that could not
17 be elsewhere, I think Ideas in particular is just
18 tremendous for the intellectual development of
19 Canadians. The Massey Lectures, I am sure, are
20 unparalleled in the world. In fact, you should be able
21 to make revenue by selling that to education systems in
22 Canada and public broadcasters around the world,
23 because I think it is unparalleled research and
24 presentation of very important ideas.
25 211 Another essential dimension is
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1 geographic. There are some areas in Canada where there
2 is no private radio; there is no other way of getting a
3 radio message. In those particular contexts, CBC has
4 to give people anything that you would normally get on
5 the radio.
6 212 You have heard that a number of times
7 today, and there are certain parts in the Yukon where
8 this is the essential, the only communications with the
9 world, whether it be emergency or information on all
10 the items that CBC deals with.
11 213 Another thing I think you should
12 evaluate, both with CBC et aussi avec Radio-Canada, is
13 national unity and how successful has it been. It has
14 been said that scientifically communication promotes
15 unity, so there is obviously a big role for CBC there.
16 I hope you will look at their success in that respect.
17 214 In relation to provincial or
18 territorial or federal levels of government, there are
19 some major issues I think that are obviously covered by
20 all sorts of journalists. If you watch a scrum in the
21 House of Commons, there are journalists all over the
22 place.
23 215 The main issues might already be
24 covered. Maybe the role then is where you need
25 detailed research in an area where it would be too much
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1 time and effort for a private broadcaster to go to get
2 all the facts out and present a really good picture to
3 people.
4 216 I remember two excellent examples in
5 the Yukon. One was related to MAI debate here. There
6 was all sorts of talk going on about people didn't know
7 what they were talking about. CBC Yukon -- I don't
8 know how they did it, but they found someone from the
9 international negotiating table that knew the facts and
10 presented them clearly so that people at least knew
11 what the issue was.
12 217 I was exceptionally impressed that at
13 least the facts would be on the table for people here
14 in the Yukon.
15 218 Another was an incredible documentary
16 they did on the sinking of the Princess Sophia, which I
17 think is just a great story. They have done an
18 excellent job. They have done a number of historical
19 documentaries over the year that you could not get from
20 any other source.
21 219 Finally, two quick comments. One is
22 nationally quite often you will hear people come and
23 say: Why does the media make an issue of this -- and I
24 guess this could be any media -- that sometimes they
25 make issues as opposed to just giving coverage on
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1 issues.
2 220 So hopefully people will be aware
3 that that doesn't occur; that something that maybe the
4 public don't think is an issue isn't made excessively
5 to an issue.
6 221 The other item which I will mention
7 in my next presentation is because they are not
8 responsible to anyone, they can have a balanced view
9 from all different perspectives to widen our horizons,
10 like Ideas does. That should, I think, go through all
11 their programming.
12 222 In this presentation I have just
13 suggested some criteria that you could look at CBC
14 programming as opposed to getting into the specifics.
15 223 That is the end of my personal
16 presentation.
17 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
18 224 MR. BAGNELL: My name is Larry
19 Bagnell. I am the Executive Director of the
20 Association of Yukon Communities, and I am going to be
21 making a short presentation on behalf of that
22 organization.
23 225 Every province and territory in
24 Canada has an Association of Municipal Governments, and
25 we are the one in the Yukon. One hundred per cent of
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1 the municipalities in the Yukon are members, and
2 probably 80 per cent of Yukoners live in municipalities
3 that are in our association.
4 226 I am not, however, going to include
5 Whitehorse today, the capital city and the largest city
6 here, because the mayor is here and will be reporting
7 later. So that would just be repeating that.
8 227 I want to state at the beginning,
9 too, that I will only be making comments from a few
10 individuals. In the short time we had, we surveyed our
11 members and we only got a few individual personal
12 comments back. The association itself does not have an
13 official position.
14 228 The first comment is not directed
15 simply at the CRTC but is sort of a general one -- and
16 I am talking now for the rural communities in our
17 association.
18 229 In the majority of times when
19 provincial or territorial or senior levels of
20 government, or the federal government, do consultation
21 like this, they don't make sufficient provision for
22 rural Canadians to get a chance.
23 230 I don't see many, if any, here today,
24 and the reason is that it wasn't made possible. This
25 is not just to the CRTC; this happens time and time
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1 again with us, and that is why we are very frustrated.
2 231 Who at the CRTC or CBC today would be
3 paying their own hotel room, would be travelling,
4 giving up two days' work to be here, would be losing
5 their salary, would be paying all of their expenses to
6 be here? No one would be. But that is what a rural
7 person would have had to do to be here today, had they
8 known about it in time.
9 232 Like I say, this happens time and
10 time again with us for all sorts of types of
11 consultations. So they get frustrated in not having
12 input in that respect.
13 233 I am going to give the three comments
14 that we got back. As I said, they are not positions of
15 the association because we didn't discuss it as an
16 association.
17 234 First of all, our President spoke in
18 glowing terms of the CBC. He thinks it is an excellent
19 service all across Canada, and provides a very
20 essential service for rural Canadians. He comes from a
21 small town in the Yukon, of 2,000 people or so. He
22 thinks the federal government should re-evaluate any
23 cuts they are doing, because the service is so
24 essential and they do a great job for Canada.
25 235 On two minor points, he did want to
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1 make sure that Dawson City was portrayed accurately on
2 the weather maps and that David Cross travels more.
3 --- Laughter / Rires
4 236 The second comment is related to the
5 question you asked about rural service. This
6 particular person thought that the Yukon was lumped in
7 the north a lot with other territories. People that
8 are not from the Yukon probably don't know that in a
9 lot of respects comparing the Yukon and the Northwest
10 Territories would be the same as Saskatchewan and
11 Prince Edward Island. There are a lot of differences;
12 different cultures; there are no roads; there are
13 limited airwaves. It is just not the same.
14 237 If on times on radio and television
15 where there is some overlap, where we get programming
16 from that other area, it really doesn't make any sense
17 for Yukoners.
18 238 Again on to another personal opinion.
19 This is from a rural administrator of a rural town, who
20 felt that was as far as TV goes, that person watches TV
21 for entertainment; that that is the prime function of
22 TV and that there is no function of public taxes being
23 used to provide entertainment.
24 239 The last comment -- actually, this is
25 the fourth one -- was from another rural mayor. My
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1 president is a rural mayor. He referred back to a
2 comment that was made on As It Happens last Sunday. As
3 you probably know, Cross Country Check-Up last Sunday
4 covered questions from the public on CBC. Several
5 people referred to the balance perspective being
6 provided in the programming.
7 240 I think that particular person was
8 talking about a left leaning, but I am just talking
9 about a balance perspective in general -- and I
10 mentioned it at the end of my last presentation -- of
11 the whole spectrum of programming.
12 241 Even the CBC host Rex Murphy seemed
13 to agree with the person and had some sympathy with the
14 opinion that if you analyzed each program, there wasn't
15 necessarily the broad spectrum of viewpoints that there
16 might be.
17 242 I don't think this means just
18 mentioning a different viewpoint or a different
19 orientation once and saying you have covered it. I
20 think it would be an evaluation of each program to make
21 sure there was a good cross-section of possible
22 viewpoints on a topic.
23 243 I was actually listening to that part
24 of the program too, and I had the same sense. But I
25 had not thought of mentioning it until this mayor
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1 actually brought it up to me as part of our review.
2 That was the one thing that struck him as well.
3 244 The other thing related to that with
4 another caller that came right after is balance
5 geographically. I think there was a caller from B.C.
6 or the Maritimes that suggested that their area did not
7 listen to the CBC because the topics weren't relevant.
8 245 I don't think that applies to us, but
9 I think it is a good thing to keep in mind in your
10 evaluation. If you do an analysis of all the issues
11 that had been covered over the last six months and
12 tally them up over the regions of the country and see
13 how it matches out, that may match with some of the
14 interest that is displayed locally.
15 246 The last thing I want to mention is
16 related to the rural dialogue that the federal
17 government is undertaking to ensure that all federal
18 programs and services, and in fact being a partnership
19 all those government programs and services are
20 sensitive to rural areas. Hopefully, the federal
21 cabinet and the CRTC and the CBC, either voluntarily or
22 mandated, will participate intensively in that
23 exercise.
24 247 The basic point of the exercise is to
25 make sure that rural Canadians' points of views are
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1 heard and that they are serviced as effectively as they
2 could be, which is a lot easier with today's
3 technology.
4 248 I think that by being part of that,
5 the CBC and the CRTC being part of that and close to
6 that, those groups may find ways to better service
7 rural Canadians from our smaller communities. I think
8 everyone would benefit from that.
9 249 Thank you.
10 250 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr.
11 Bagnell. You are a very busy man, by the sounds of
12 things.
13 251 MR. BAGNELL: Thank you.
14 252 THE CHAIRPERSON: While I will be
15 reviewing some of the process issues when we finish
16 this afternoon, I just want to point out, with respect
17 to your comments on the difficulty of the more remote
18 communities participating in consultations, that
19 everything that takes place in these consultations
20 forms part of the public record; but so, too, do all
21 written submissions to us, and people can also submit
22 by e-mail until the end of April. Everything is given
23 the same weight.
24 253 I just want to point that out to you
25 at this moment.
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1 254 Thank you very much for your
2 presentation.
3 255 MR. BAGNELL: Thank you. For some of
4 our rural people those may not be the best methods for
5 them to input, because e-mail doesn't actually go to
6 all rural Yukoners. There is a lot of improvement and
7 a lot of investment in that right now. They will
8 shortly, but right now some of them can't even access
9 that.
10 256 THE CHAIRPERSON: And then there is
11 regular mail as well.
12 257 MS PINSKY: The next presenter in
13 Whitehorse is Ms Kathy Watson.
14 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
15 258 MS WATSON: Good afternoon. I want
16 to thank the CBC for the invitation to present to the
17 CRTC hearings today, and to congratulate you on behalf
18 of someone who suffers from the frustrations of public
19 consultation for including Yukon in your consultation.
20 259 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
21 260 MS WATSON: I am going to basically
22 go through the points also that were addressed in the
23 questions that were identified in the press release;
24 and if I tend to ramble a little bit, it is only
25 because I have had added comment as I have been
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1 listening today and from other people who made comment
2 at the last minute from the city of Whitehorse with
3 regard to the issues.
4 261 So forgive me if it seems a bit
5 disjointed.
6 262 The first question was:
7 "In your view, how well does the
8 CBC fulfil its role as the
9 national public broadcaster?"
10 263 I am a real CBC radio fan. I have to
11 confess that my bias will be to the radio, simply
12 because I had the opportunity to write the notes.
13 264 I would like to say that CBC does
14 bring the national perspective to the remote areas of
15 Canada, and I see that very much as the role of the
16 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation or any public
17 broadcasting entity. I find the balance between the
18 information and the entertainment values with CBC radio
19 to be perfect for my own perspective.
20 265 I find that CBC reflects the Canadian
21 attitudes about international issues, which is really
22 refreshing when we look at our television opportunities
23 for international and national news. We often get a
24 very strong dose of American attitude included in the
25 stories that come from the American channels. We all
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1 know that we certainly have lots of opportunities to
2 benefit from American television.
3 266 So I find the Canadian Broadcasting
4 Corporation to be quite refreshing in that regard.
5 267 I think that the CBC provides
6 Canadians with an opportunity to be informed about
7 local issues on a national level, and that helps to
8 keep the country connected, if you like; that CBC often
9 provides the thread that keeps us stitched together.
10 268 In the Yukon, I think it would be
11 important to recognize that very often a large number
12 of us come from other places, other parts of Canada and
13 the world. We can count on CBC to keep us connected to
14 our roots, if we are of Canadian origin and yet moved
15 several miles away. I am certainly one of those people
16 who benefits from that.
17 269 The provision of national radio and
18 television to the remote communities is helping to keep
19 the local issues in perspective as well. A previous
20 speaker spoke on behalf of many of our small
21 communities. I used to function as his president of
22 the Association of Yukon Communities, and I am well
23 aware of how important it is to keep the issues in
24 perspective when you are dealing with municipal
25 leadership.
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1 270 I feel that by accessing the
2 information that is provided through the news channels
3 of the CBC, it does very much help to keep in
4 perspective what other communities are dealing with
5 while we struggle with some of the same issues.
6 271 I would also have to say that locally
7 CBC radio sets the standard for the local media to try
8 to keep up to. As one who is frustrated from time to
9 time with communicating to the public and as someone
10 who speaks for the public on many occasions, I find it
11 very important that we have a standard-setter that
12 would bring the quality of broadcasting that CBC brings
13 to the local interests.
14 272 I do believe that when CBC is on the
15 job, the media coverage is better in any event. And I
16 can speak from some experience.
17 273 There was a local decision made some
18 time ago after we were feeling the first effects of the
19 rather dramatic budget cuts of a few years ago when
20 city council meetings were no longer covered by CBC.
21 It definitely changed the prospective of the reporting
22 on the council procedures, which I don't think was to
23 the better.
24 274 When CBC realized that we were the
25 newsmakers and it was a priority again to attend
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1 Whitehorse city council meetings, we found that the
2 reporting was much more accurate and broader; that we
3 would see issues covered in a more holistic way, if you
4 like.
5 275 The next question was:
6 "In the new millennium, should
7 the CBC fulfil its role in a
8 different manner than it has in
9 the past?"
10 276 My advice would be to stay the course
11 with regard to attention to the local broadcast
12 stations. In fact, I would encourage you to
13 increase -- to take us back to local management
14 priority here. We are struggling with being glommed in
15 with the rest of the North.
16 277 Several speakers have made reference
17 to the differences that are evident from the
18 perspective of the rest of the country. If you
19 actually look at a map of Canada and compare the
20 distance between Yellowknife and Whitehorse, for
21 instance, if you were thinking of distance only rather
22 than population, as you can well imagine, the distances
23 are as vast as they would be between Edmonton and
24 Vancouver. It is with the help of such people as the
25 CBC that we can give Canadians a more appropriate
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1 perspective of who we are and how we differ.
2 278 Some of the best things about
3 Canadians are the ways they are different from each
4 other. Yes, we have a lot in common, but we are not
5 the same people, any more than the people in Edmonton
6 and Vancouver are the same people.
7 279 I would encourage you to keep setting
8 the standard at the local media level, to encourage CBC
9 to be allowed to do that.
10 280 I would also like to see less
11 repetition of programming. We have heard other
12 presenters make reference to that, so I won't go into
13 that in much detail.
14 281 I would also like to see more
15 Canadian content in the CBC television that we are
16 benefiting from here. I think that is the role of a
17 public broadcaster, and certainly we have no trouble
18 filling our airwaves with the incredible Canadian
19 talent on the radio side. And I would challenge us to
20 try to do the same thing where television coverage is
21 concerned.
22 "How well does the CBC serve the
23 public on a regional...level?"
24 282 Locally, CBC radio sets the standard
25 for the media, as I have already mentioned. I believe
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1 that there is good coverage of local issues, but I
2 believe the coverage could be better outside of
3 Whitehorse for issues and interest stories that are
4 taking place outside of the locally referred to urban
5 environment.
6 283 We recognize the effects of budget
7 cuts, and we see those in the coverage of some of the
8 news items that take place outside of the Whitehorse
9 area.
10 284 Remote communities rely very heavily
11 on CBC for information of a local nature, and this
12 requires a healthy and effective public broadcasting
13 network.
14 285 There was reference made earlier to
15 receiving our weather forecasts, that don't change from
16 morning to night on the weekends, that are produced out
17 of Yellowknife. We have people who make their living
18 on the land in the North, not only in the Yukon but
19 across the North. While a weather forecast for someone
20 who lives in downtown anywhere else in Canada might
21 mean what clothing to I wear today, do I bring my
22 umbrella, do I wear my galoshes, it can be a matter of
23 life and death to have an accurate weather forecast if
24 you are a northern family making your living on the
25 land.
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1 286 I think that that idea has been
2 forgotten with the provision of accurate weather
3 forecasting. Locally, we suffer from the closure of
4 our local weather office, which I think has had quite
5 an impact on our weather information.
6 287 I just want to stress the point that
7 it is important that we have accurate local weather
8 forecasts that we can understand. And I have to say
9 that locally we have seen that slip a lot. I am not
10 sure if we are in the central part or in the southern
11 part, or if we are included in --
12 288 We have made some changes to the way
13 the forecast is made on CBC radio that leaves a lot of
14 us totally confused as to what we are to expect.
15 289 I think that when we look at public
16 broadcasting, we have to remember that one of the
17 reasons that we have public broadcasting is to provide
18 service where no opportunity for entrepreneurial
19 service exists, and that certainly is extremely
20 relevant here in the Yukon.
21 290 We have talked about homes where
22 broadcasting opportunities are not there, where people
23 actually can't listen to radio. I think with today's
24 technologies we should be a little more sensitive to
25 providing the same services throughout.
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1 291 I don't want to repeat things that
2 have already been mentioned here, so I am just going
3 through my notes for a second.
4 292 THE CHAIRPERSON: Take your time.
5 293 MS WATSON: I want to stress again
6 that we certainly have seen the impact of the budget
7 cuts locally, and they really do have a very poignant
8 impact on the local flavour of the local broadcasting.
9 294 The next question I want to address
10 is:
11 "How well does the CBC serve the
12 public on a...national level?"
13 295 I have made some reference to this
14 earlier.
15 296 All CBC listeners and interviewers
16 have the same opportunity to be as informed as each
17 other. I think that is a totally relevant issue when
18 it comes to national broadcasting. In other
19 jurisdictions it seems that the quality of reporting
20 has lost focus on some of the issues.
21 297 I think that this is not just an
22 issue that is particular to CBC, but I see it in the
23 media in a broader way. Reporting is supposed to keep
24 the masses informed and not to create a story and not
25 to prompt public opinion, but to bring information to
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1 the masses.
2 298 As I said, I don't see this just as a
3 CBC broadcasting issue, but I see it as an issue that
4 is becoming very important nationally. We have been
5 inundated with the garbage of American politics and
6 media created hype over stories that quickly lost
7 interest to their common people in the United States.
8 299 I would hate to see Canadian
9 broadcasting following in those footsteps. I find it
10 tacky, distasteful and totally irrelevant to the
11 important issues of a national perspective. I would
12 guard any national broadcaster to avoid that.
13 300 I would just stress that Canadians
14 are more open-minded, and they prefer to make their own
15 opinions based on the facts. I think we want to stay
16 focused on that.
17 301 I mentioned earlier that national
18 broadcasting is an effective tool at communicating
19 local lifestyles and stories to the national observer.
20 I would encourage CBC to stay focused on that, again
21 being a very important standard-setter.
22 302 I have to say that, personally, I
23 love the national programming. Vinyl Cafe is the time
24 on my weekend when no one is allowed to interrupt me.
25 That is my favourite program, and I look forward to it.
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1 The minute it is over, I look forward to the next
2 Sunday.
3 303 I also really enjoy Arthur Black and
4 Definitely Not The Opera, and I have to say that the
5 quality of national programming on CBC radio is just
6 excellent.
7 304 The next question is:
8 "Should the programming provided
9 by CBC radio and television be
10 different from that provided by
11 other broadcasters?"
12 305 I have touched on that a bit in my
13 comments previously. I think that we have to stay
14 focused on the local-to-national and national-to-local
15 perspective.
16 306 Reliance in the smaller and more
17 remote communities on keeping connected with the
18 national issues is really vital, and also keeping the
19 national interest focused on lifestyles of all
20 Canadians is extremely and equally as vital.
21 307 We want to stay focused on providing
22 service where service is not likely to be provided by
23 private interests, but we also don't want to do that at
24 the expense of providing a balance in communities where
25 there are other opportunities as well.
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1 "Is there a special role that
2 the CBC should play in the
3 presentation of Canadian
4 programming?"
5 308 I have already mentioned -- and I am
6 sorry to be so repetitive -- that I think the Canadian
7 television opportunities for exposure to Canadian
8 talent are being underutilized. I think the more
9 exposure we get, the better the quality of Canadian
10 entertainment.
11 309 Let's face it, the world is paying
12 attention to Canadian talent, and there is sure lots of
13 it. We are a real beneficiary of extremely talented
14 people here in the North, and I think we have seen that
15 in some of the CBC broadcasting that has been produced
16 locally and broadcast nationally. So let's not lose
17 sight of that, and let's please give Canadians the best
18 opportunity to be promoted through Canadian television.
19 310 I also have to say that the quality
20 of staying local with local broadcasting has been very,
21 very good.
22 311 I am going to read to you one of the
23 comments from one of the people at the city of
24 Whitehorse who provided comments. I just want to share
25 it with you because I think it is easier through his
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1 words than through mine.
2 "Whitehorse listeners appreciate
3 past efforts of CBC to reflect
4 regional issues. Our community
5 appreciates that in recent years
6 Peter Gzowski, Arthur Black and
7 other hosts have been
8 broadcasting national shows from
9 Whitehorse and other communities
10 north of 60." (As read)
11 312 That would include Vicki Gabbereau
12 recently.
13 "In addition, several special
14 features have covered northern
15 issues. The frequency and
16 extent of regionally produced
17 shows and special features
18 should increase because they
19 provide all Canadians an
20 increasingly vital exposure to
21 important northern issues. More
22 frequent national programs
23 produced from northern
24 communities and smaller capital
25 cities, such as Whitehorse, will
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1 give CBC programming a more
2 national character." (As read)
3 313 I want to finish my comments today by
4 bringing one more personal perspective to the table,
5 and that is with regard to two programs that we no
6 longer hear on CBC radio. One of them is Double
7 Exposure, which gave us all a great opportunity to
8 laugh at ourselves and certainly was another program
9 that I used to look forward to on a weekly basis. And
10 I really miss Vicki in the afternoons.
11 314 Thank you very much on behalf of
12 Whitehorse for the opportunity to present to you today.
13 315 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
14 much, Mayor Watson.
15 1445
16 316 MS PINSKY: The next presenter in
17 Whitehorse is Mr. John Irving.
18 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
19 317 MR. IRVING: Thank you for allowing
20 me to attend. I did have to miss work to be here, but
21 I think it is very important. If I was living in the
22 communities and was made aware of it, I would have been
23 in here. I would have paid my hotel; I would have lost
24 two days' wages.
25 318 I will say at the top that in the
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1 last decade of cutbacks to CBC, it has been heard
2 throughout the North. I have been in the North since
3 1960, all over the North. I have made my home in
4 Whitehorse for the past 22 years.
5 319 The national issues are covered very
6 well, and I think there isn't a particular bias. I
7 think we get both sides of the issue.
8 320 I am not going to speak to TV. I am
9 just going to speak to radio, AM radio, because we
10 don't have the opportunity to get CBC Two. I lived in
11 Labrador for a number of years. I have friends and
12 family from one end of the country to the next. So
13 with communication with them, I know what their issues
14 are and I see them reflected in a national perspective
15 on CBC One.
16 321 The cutbacks have been draining.
17 What can I say. The only comparison is the cutbacks to
18 the trains, in that they just kept cutting back and
19 cutting back and cutting back, and pretty soon people
20 didn't want to be on the trains. Well, guess what?
21 Now they don's have passenger service. Are you
22 surprised?
23 322 If CBC is kept cut back at the rate
24 that they have been over this last decade, nobody will
25 tune in three years. If they dribble it out, maybe
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1 they can make it last ten years. But pretty soon
2 people will turn off.
3 323 And guess what we will have to listen
4 to? We get to listen to the broadcast news from the
5 American stations, with American perspectives. You
6 don't get the national issues. And we get mostly
7 music -- if you want to call it that. Some of it is
8 like noise. I guess it is a matter of taste.
9 324 But it is not what I consider a
10 viable alternative. I hear a lot of people say: Oh, I
11 don't listen to CBC. I don't care if CBC goes off the
12 air. But when you are sitting around the lunch room
13 and talk about issues, they are talking about issues
14 that are brought up on Cross Country Check-Up and they
15 are talking about issues that are brought up on As It
16 Happens.
17 325 I made it a point over the last
18 number of years not to initiate these. They are
19 initiated with people who have no contact with CBC. So
20 I kind of smile to myself and carry on the
21 conversation.
22 326 I don't know what the per cent of
23 people is that listens to CBC. If it is only 10 per
24 cent of the population, I would suggest that most of
25 them would be in the North. I feel very sorry for the
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1 ignorant people in southern Canada who don't get the
2 national perspective. If they do, I don't know where
3 they are getting it from. They are not getting it from
4 The Globe and Mail or the papers out of Montreal, or
5 Halifax for that matter.
6 327 I thank you for listening to me and
7 taking my perspective.
8 328 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you for
9 participating, Mr. Irving.
10 329 MS PINSKY: The next presenter in
11 Whitehorse is Ms Barbara Drury.
12 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
13 330 MS DRURY: I am speaking as a farmer
14 and somebody that lives out of Whitehorse. I am
15 speaking on behalf of CBC radio, because that is what
16 is really important to me and my family and friends.
17 331 I represent, actually, probably a lot
18 of people in what I am saying here, because everybody I
19 know, and all my family, listen to CBC, and we have
20 just about all our lives.
21 332 I have lived in B.C. and I have lived
22 in the Yukon, between these two provinces or
23 territories, all my life. I am dependent on CBC to
24 give me a national perspective on the news, and I am
25 dependent on CBC to give me the local perspective of
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1 whatever community that I have lived in.
2 333 I really love this radio station. I
3 think it is terrible the way the federal government is
4 withholding support from it. I think it is one of the
5 best things that we have in this country. It ties us
6 together as Canadians. It brings us together in our
7 local communities too.
8 334 I listen to the local morning radio,
9 the noon show and I would listen in the afternoon, as
10 well, to get anything that might have happened during
11 the day. It keeps us up to date.
12 335 I really like the national shows as
13 well, like As It Happens, Cross Country Check-Up,
14 Tapestry, and The Science Show at noon on Saturday; and
15 Quirks and Quarks and Arthur Black. I could go on and
16 on, I guess, but I think you can get my drift that it's
17 a really important radio station. I think the federal
18 government really needs to support it, because by
19 supporting CBC radio, I think they are supporting
20 Canada.
21 336 Thanks very much.
22 337 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
23 much, Ms Drury.
24 338 MS PINSKY: The two other presenters
25 who are in Whitehorse can proceed. I am sorry, I
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1 didn't catch their names. These are the two who had
2 not registered.
3 339 MS NESBITT-DUFOR: Can you hear me?
4 340 MS PINSKY: Yes.
5 341 MS NESBITT-DUFOR: I am one of the
6 people who registered ten days ago but whose name is
7 not on the list.
8 342 MS PINSKY: That's fine. What is
9 your name?
10 343 MS NESBITT-DUFOR: My name is
11 Jennifer Nesbitt-Dufor.
12 344 May I continue?
13 345 MS PINSKY: Yes.
14 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
15 346 MS NESBITT-DUFOR: I live in rural
16 Yukon now. When I first came to Canada, it was
17 straight to a small northern one-industry town where I
18 remained for the next 13 years.
19 347 CBC programs on radio and television
20 were then, as they are now, my only experience of other
21 parts of Canada and of Canada as a whole. CBC gave me
22 a perspective on local, national and world events, as
23 seen from a Canadian point of view. It educated me
24 about other regions of Canada which I did not know. It
25 gave me an interest in Canadian politics, culture,
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1 science, music, humour and it gave me a sense of
2 belonging in a new country.
3 348 My children grew up watching and
4 enjoying the excellent children's programming on CBC
5 television. Now they are in their thirties, and they
6 are watching CBC again. I have one son who has spent
7 some time in the U.S.A. He tells me of having access
8 to 500 television channels there but finding hardly
9 anything worth watching on them. I have the same
10 experience myself when I visit friends who have cable
11 television service.
12 349 If CBC did not exist, how would
13 people in rural areas, who do not have or cannot afford
14 cable or Internet service, have access to national
15 broadcasting?
16 350 CBC radio serves regions very well
17 indeed, in my opinion. Here in the Yukon we have
18 excellent local news and programs, while the national
19 radio programming on CBC gives us interesting news and
20 information from all the other provinces.
21 351 There is a feeling of knowing what is
22 happening across Canada as a whole. There is a rich
23 variety of political discussion and comment of music,
24 popular culture, science and humour. There is a
25 consideration of different ethnic and cultural groups.
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1 I particularly value the fact that CBC radio is
2 commercial free.
3 352 I do have a problem with CBC policy
4 as it affects the recent transfer of a very popular
5 music program on Radio One and Radio Two, stereo FM.
6 People like myself who live in rural areas do not have
7 access to CBC stereo. Many of us cannot afford to have
8 Internet service.
9 353 We would ask that CBC rebroadcast
10 such programs which have been transferred, rebroadcast
11 them on Radio One and not just remove them from it.
12 354 CBC television programming scheduling
13 could be improved in our area. Regular regional
14 programming here consists of one half hour of northern
15 news in the evening. This is additional to three hours
16 of existing news we already have in the prime time
17 between 6:00 and 11:30 p.m. In that time slot, we get
18 one-and-a-half hours of B.C. news, one-and-a-half hours
19 of national news, and half-an-hour of northern news.
20 This adds up to a total of three-and-a-half hours of
21 news, leaving only two hours for other programs.
22 355 In order to bring us this, national
23 programming in that extra half-hour time slot is
24 preempted and it so often is the arts programs that we
25 miss. We can't get Adrian Clarkson. We can't watch
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1 Laurie Brown on the arts, because we have an additional
2 half hour of news programmed instead.
3 356 I would like to see one half-hour of
4 B.C. news dropped, so that we could have the national
5 programming in that time slot.
6 357 It is far too difficult to find out
7 what program schedules are on CBC North television.
8 Since national programs are pre-empted for northern
9 news in the evenings, none of the published national TV
10 listings work. I can't find any CBC North schedule on
11 the CBC Internet site. I can get a printout from the
12 local CBC office of that particular evening's
13 programming, but that is far too difficult to do on a
14 daily basis.
15 358 Overall, however, I would very much
16 like to see the CBC get increased funding, which would
17 be long-term and stable so that it can go on making
18 programs which, in my opinion, are unique and which
19 contribute to the unity of the country.
20 359 CBC should have adequate funding so
21 that its employees are paid on par with the private
22 sector. It should be independent from business and
23 from government so that it can be critical and
24 controversial when need be. Rather than having to
25 close foreign bureaus, it should have more funding so
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1 that it can go on maintaining journalists in all parts
2 of the world to keep Canadians informed; more funding
3 so that programs like North of Sixty are not cancelled
4 because they are not commercially possible.
5 360 It should be helped to maintain the
6 successful role it plays now.
7 361 I value the CBC very highly. It is
8 one of the reason I am still here in Canada, and it is
9 one of the reasons I chose to become a Canadian
10 citizen.
11 362 Thank you.
12 363 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Ms
13 Nesbitt-Dufor.
14 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
15 364 MS NOBLE: Can you hear me all right?
16 365 THE CHAIRPERSON: We can hear you.
17 Can you identify yourself, please.
18 366 MS NOBLE: Yes. My name is Gail
19 Noble. I am a resident of Whitehorse, where I have
20 lived and worked since 1985.
21 367 Before coming to the Yukon, I lived
22 and worked in Nanaimo and Prince George, British
23 Columbia, St. John's, Newfoundland, and Inuvik in the
24 Northwest Territories.
25 368 I mention where I lived previously
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1 because I, like many other people in Canada, came here
2 as an immigrant. I came in 1974 from the United States
3 and went straight to Inuvik as a landed immigrant.
4 369 I am still here. I am retiring in
5 May, and I will be staying in Canada. A key element of
6 my experience in Canada and my decision not to return
7 to the United States where my family lives has been,
8 and continues to be, the CBC.
9 370 It is primarily CBC radio. I never
10 owned a TV until I came to the Yukon, because most of
11 my work has been on the road, so to speak, in isolated
12 areas, and because of the local programming of CBC.
13 371 As was mentioned by Mayor Watson, it
14 is pretty crucial to know what the road conditions are
15 and what the weather is up ahead when it is minus 35
16 Celsius and blowing snow.
17 372 CBC has taught me about Canada, a
18 place I knew nothing about until I landed here some
19 years ago. Being used to what I call the wasteland of
20 what passes for radio and TV in the United States, I
21 have become totally dependent on CBC for news, weather,
22 entertainment and an understanding of Canada; from
23 north to south, from east to west.
24 373 I have met a lot of people today. I
25 don't have a lot of time to read or watch TV, but I can
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1 always tune in to CBC while I am doing other things,
2 like washing windows or washing the dishes. CBC keeps
3 me up to date on what is happening locally, nationally
4 and internationally.
5 374 I will also add that we are in the
6 North, and newspapers like The Globe and Mail, The
7 Vancouver Sun, and papers from Edmonton often don't get
8 here. Often they are bumped on the plane. Often they
9 arrive late. And they are often more expensive.
10 375 I trust CBC. Why? Because it is the
11 public broadcaster. It is paid for by money as a
12 taxpayer, as well as taxpayers across the country. Its
13 mandate is to the people of Canada, not to the
14 temporary politicians who come and go, not the IT&Ts or
15 Microsofts of the world. It is money I happily pay in
16 taxes, and not to advertisers who do influence what is
17 being presented on TV.
18 376 Personally, I can remember many a day
19 and night, driving or trying to drive home in white-out
20 conditions on isolated lonely stretches of the Yukon,
21 on the winter roads on the way to Tuktoyaktuk or
22 logging roads in northern B.C. I was usually alone. I
23 was scared. I was tired. But I could almost always
24 tune in to CBC and still be in touch with the world,
25 listening to Peter Gzowski, Alan Maitland, and it was
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1 sort of like a warm fire. I knew I was going to make
2 it.
3 377 Nationally, I think CBC is crucial to
4 our understanding of each other and of what is
5 important to all aspects of the country.
6 378 One of the greatest events in my life
7 was the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry of Justice
8 Thomas Berger. Do you remember that? The inquiry was
9 a landmark in Canadian history and an example for many
10 places around the world. Canada did it right. It
11 enabled all the actors and all those affected to
12 present their viewpoints on a national scene.
13 379 A crucial reason why the pipeline
14 inquiry was so important is because of CBC. A lot of
15 people in central and southern Canada knew nothing
16 about the North, and they could have cared less. That
17 was until the inquiry became available to everyone in
18 Canada on regular radio broadcasts right across the
19 country and in the languages people could understand.
20 380 I remember huddling by the radio in
21 Fort Good Hope or Sacks Harbour or in Halifax or in
22 Ottawa and listening to the daily broadcast of CBC on
23 the day's events on the pipeline inquiry. I also
24 remember the faces of the people in Palituk(ph), Fort
25 Franklin, and Holman Island as they listened to
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1 themselves on the radio. For the first time, someone
2 was listening to them. They were part of Canada.
3 381 Besides our own issues, I think the
4 CBC is crucial in enabling us to understand what is
5 happening around the world. This is terribly important
6 for a trading country. I never cease to be amazed at
7 the ignorance of my friends south of the border. They
8 don't know much about what is happening outside of the
9 U.S., even though their actions have a powerful effect
10 on other people all around the world. The United
11 States does not have a public broadcaster like CBC,
12 whose mandate is to assist Canadians to learn about
13 each other, and also to hear about the world and to
14 broadcast what Canada is about to the world.
15 382 In closing, I want to say that if we
16 think democracy is the best form of government, then
17 all of us have to have access to accurate information
18 and a variety of viewpoints. In Canada today,
19 particularly with the buying up of newspapers by
20 various conglomerates, there is no source of accurate
21 and current information on events internally and
22 externally, except CBC, the public broadcaster.
23 383 Thank you.
24 384 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
25 much, Ms Noble.
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1 385 I think what we will do is take a
2 ten-minute break at this juncture. When we return, we
3 will go to Yellowknife and hear the presenters there.
4 386 My question to people on the line in
5 Inuvik and Whitehorse is: Would you like to remain on
6 and hear the presentations from Yellowknife?
7 387 Are you there?
8 388 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Yes. I think
9 they are just taking a poll in the room. Just a
10 moment.
11 389 THE CHAIRPERSON: I will explain why.
12 When we are finished with the calls from Yellowknife,
13 the CBC representative here will respond briefly. If
14 you had not wanted to stay on, I thought she could
15 maybe respond now and then again after Yellowknife.
16 390 That is the reason I asked.
17 391 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Our people are
18 going to stay here.
19 392 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
20 much. We will all be back in ten minutes.
21 --- Recess at 1510 / Suspension à 1510
22 --- Upon resuming at 1520 / Reprise à 1520
23 393 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good afternoon.
24 Welcome back.
25 394 Whitehorse, are you there?
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1 395 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Whitehorse is
2 here.
3 396 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good. How about
4 Yellowknife?
5 397 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Can you hear
6 us?
7 398 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes, we can hear
8 you fine. Can you hear us?
9 399 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Yes, we can.
10 400 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good. Inuvik, are
11 you there?
12 --- No response / Pas de réponse
13 401 MS PINSKY: Our first presenter from
14 Yellowknife will be Mr. Brad Heath.
15 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
16 402 MR. HEATH: Hi. My name is Brad
17 Heath. I will try to keep my comments brief. If I
18 lose my train of thought, bear with me. I have been
19 scratching out things and adding things to my notes
20 while listening to the other people. So I am in kind
21 of a mess here.
22 403 THE CHAIRPERSON: No problem.
23 404 MR. HEATH: I am speaking as a
24 private citizen. I don't watch TV, so most of my
25 comments are on CBC radio.
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1 405 I came to Yellowknife in 1987 to work
2 as a reporter and photographer for The Yellowknifer and
3 News North newspapers, and I have been here ever since.
4 I am now self-employed as a freelance writer and
5 photographer.
6 406 During my years as a reporter, I
7 lived and worked in a dozen small towns and cities in
8 Ontario, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia and
9 the Northwest Territories. This has given me a
10 first-hand view on the importance of CBC for those of
11 us who live in rural Canada.
12 407 In short, I believe the CBC is the
13 only media that truly connects Canadians from sea to
14 sea to sea. Rarely do you find stories in The Globe
15 and Mail about the Northwest Territories.
16 408 Actually, one of the few regrets in
17 my life is that I didn't discover CBC radio until I was
18 a college student. I think growing up I would have
19 known more about my own country if I had.
20 409 I was born and raised in the deep
21 south of Ontario, less than an hour-and-a-half from
22 Detroit; and as a result, in my youth I listened almost
23 exclusively to radio stations broadcasting out of
24 Detroit. If I could go back in time, I would gladly
25 switch from those Detroit stations to CBC radio. I
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1 deeply regret that I came so late to knowing a Canadian
2 such as the late Stan Rogers.
3 410 I disagree with people who say that
4 private broadcasters could fulfil the role of the CBC.
5 We might save taxpayer dollars, but in my opinion much
6 of what private broadcasters give people is the
7 broadcast equivalent of junk food; a diet of violence,
8 sexual and racial stereotypes and infomercials:
9 programs such as Beavis and Butthead, Gerry Springer,
10 Howard Stern and Bay Watch.
11 411 On the other hand, CBC provides us
12 with intelligent, thought-provoking programs which
13 expose listeners to a wide variety of opinions, music,
14 cultures and ideas: quality programs such as Ideas,
15 This Morning, As it Happens, Quirks and Quarks, Basic
16 Black, Nature of Things, This Hour Has 22 Minutes,
17 Fifth Estate and many more, including my personal
18 favourite The Vinyl Cafe.
19 412 Personally, I consider Stuart McLean
20 a story-teller on par with Stephen Leacock.
21 413 I believe that both CBC TV and radio
22 are essential services in Canada. As I said before,
23 they link us from sea to sea to sea, and they give a
24 voice to Canadians in remote regions and communities.
25 I think there is little doubt that these voices would
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1 be silent if left to private broadcasters.
2 414 I also think that CBC North is
3 essential because it provides aboriginal language
4 programming. I think it is a vital element in the
5 struggle to preserve aboriginal languages.
6 415 The CBC is also one of the few media
7 agencies which actually employs a significant number of
8 aboriginal broadcasters and reporters.
9 416 Those are my comments.
10 417 National programming, I would like to
11 see the CBC radio stay as it is. I think it is just
12 wonderful. For CBC North, I think that funding has to
13 be restored so that we can bring the quality of the
14 programming back to what it was a few years ago. I
15 think the funding cuts by the federal Liberals have
16 resulted in a serious lowering of the quality of the
17 programming we get here.
18 418 I know that people probably do the
19 best they can with a limited budget, but we get weather
20 updates and forecasts and reports about four times an
21 hour. I sadly refer to the CBC programming now as the
22 weather channel, because that is what we get a lot of.
23 As I think Mr. Lendrum commented, we have too much
24 repetition.
25 419 I would just like to respond to
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1 someone who said that they thought the CBC had not a
2 balanced enough point of view, with more of a left
3 view. I think there is no shortage of venues for
4 people whose opinions are to the right of the general.
5 420 That's all. Thanks.
6 421 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
7 much, Mr. Heath.
8 422 MS PINSKY: The next presenter in
9 Yellowknife is Mr. Bill Powless.
10 423 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good evening,
11 Mr. Powless. You may begin your presentation.
12 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
13 424 MR. POWLESS: Thank you. While I
14 appreciate CBC national radio and television
15 broadcasting in many programs, and I have respected
16 many of the efforts of the CBC Mackenzie Regional Radio
17 and Television Department, nevertheless I believe the
18 regional service is a large expense that could be
19 redirected.
20 425 It lacks the objectivity to recognize
21 the flaws and efficiencies of their programming and
22 should be closed. The lack of objectivity may be
23 attributed to the fact that the Regional Director of
24 Radio and Television is the wife of a territorial
25 Cabinet Minister. How else can you explain that there
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1 is a whole afternoon every weekday, four hours, from
2 1305 to 1700 hours, devoted to aboriginal languages:
3 Dogrib, North and South Slavey and Chipewyan. Compare
4 this to CBC Yukon regional radio schedule.
5 426 The same time segment shows The
6 Valley Voice, with Peter Novak, Richardson's Round-Up
7 and Yukon Today, with Becky Stregler(ph). The only
8 aboriginal language program is People Speak Gwich'in
9 from after the 1700 news to 1800 hours on Sunday
10 evening.
11 427 When I told this to the CBC North
12 Program Marketing Coordinator, she answered that the
13 Yukon actually has more aboriginal languages than the
14 Northwest Territories, and that makes it impractical to
15 have aboriginal programming.
16 428 That's a good answer, but at what
17 number does it become impractical?
18 429 The Broadcasting Act states:
19 "The national broadcasting
20 service should be a balanced
21 service of information,
22 enlightenment and entertainment
23 for people of different ages,
24 interests and tastes, covering
25 the whole range of programming
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1 in fair proportion." (As read)
2 430 Does the Mackenzie network consider
3 itself exempt from these requirements?
4 431 The CBC Mackenzie network has
5 hijacked the mandate of the native communication
6 society, both in radio and TV. The objects of the said
7 society are:
8 "(a) to promote and develop
9 improved communications with,
10 and between native communities
11 of the NWT; (b) to promote and
12 develop communications between
13 the native people of the
14 Northwest Territories and
15 non-natives of the Northwest
16 Territories, as well as with
17 natives and non-natives of other
18 than the Northwest Territories;
19 and (c) to develop, operate and
20 maintain mass media and
21 generally undertake any activity
22 which, in the opinion of the
23 members, will assist in the
24 promoting of the objects of the
25 society." (As read)
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1 432 The radio transmissions of the
2 society all operate under the call sign of CKLB, and
3 their coverage is very close to duplicating or
4 exceeding that of the CBC Mackenzie network.
5 433 The TV transmissions are broadcast by
6 NCTV -- that is Northern Canada Television -- who say
7 they serve more communities than CBC. They also say
8 their viewers do not require cable or a dish; that a
9 rabbit ear antenna is all that is required.
10 434 We can see duplication of the CBC
11 North TV program North Beat, which shows on the CBC
12 Mackenzie network at 2000 to 2030, and the same show
13 appears on NCTV, the same night, at 2200 to 2230.
14 435 Meanwhile, the Mackenzie network
15 shows our so-called regional news broadcast at 1900
16 hours, which originates in B.C., and contains little,
17 if any, interest in our locality. This time slot might
18 be appropriate for North Beat.
19 436 The CBC Mackenzie radio network tries
20 to justify its presence by providing "survival
21 information". When I complained to the CBC North
22 Program Marketing Coordinator that when an announcer
23 said they were giving the weather, they proceeded to
24 give the forecast. She answered she didn't have a
25 problem calling a forecast the weather.
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1 437 It reminded me of a comment I heard
2 on the radio at the time Perrin Beatty became CBC
3 president and there were large CBC layoffs, to the
4 effect that: Facts are expensive; opinion is cheap.
5 You are going to get a lot more opinion. Exactly.
6 438 Weather conditions are facts and
7 forecasts are opinions.
8 439 What we have in the CBC Mackenzie
9 radio network are 11 forecast areas and 21 reporting
10 stations, and a weather report is over four minutes
11 long. I requested having the conditions read before
12 the forecast, but they didn't change the order.
13 440 I don't believe anyone correlates the
14 forecast with the subsequent weather. Last May in a
15 seven-day period rain was forecast for two of the days
16 and a 50 per cent chance of rain for three of the days.
17 In that seven days, I detected no rain, and I was
18 looking.
19 441 One announcer even starts with: Here
20 is your CBC forecast. Is this the CBC's area of
21 expertise? At least when Environment Canada had a
22 Yellowknife office, the forecast was very accurate.
23 442 Personally, I prefer weather
24 conditions as survival information. But we are served
25 a recorded forecast after the hourly news all the time.
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1 That's while the national programming is on. It may be
2 12 hours or more before hearing actual weather
3 conditions.
4 443 The recorded forecasts are made for
5 both CBC Mackenzie and the Yukon by the same announcer,
6 so that when I told Ian Hanna(ph) of the CBC News
7 Department that these announcers aren't in the radio
8 station on the weekend, he answered: There's always
9 someone in the station. But he didn't say if there was
10 an announcer.
11 444 When I asked him if they are paid for
12 these recorded announcements, he replied that their
13 employees get paid for their work. It sounds like a
14 cottage industry.
15 445 One example of the disconnect of
16 survival information was when several of the recorded
17 hourly forecasts announced by Walter Brown mentioned
18 the North Great Slave area should have a few clouds, a
19 low of 12 degrees Celsius, and tomorrow sunny, with a
20 high of 23 degrees Celsius; no mention of the dense
21 smoke from the fires around Reid and Tibet(ph) Lake.
22 The smoke was so dense that the Ingram Trail Road was
23 closed at the Dethet(ph) turnoff. It was pointless to
24 call the radio station, because the radio message said
25 the station would re-open Monday morning.
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1 446 It was the same response that was
2 given one Saturday afternoon when, after a power
3 failure, the station went off the air for about one
4 hour. It finally came back on the air. May the person
5 who is always there finally noticed.
6 447 CBC Yellowknife, CFYK radio, is
7 supposed to have back-up power in case of power
8 failure. I did notice that Dave Bondy, who is the new
9 announcer on Saturday and Sunday morning program called
10 Northern Air now gives a phone number at which he can
11 be contacted in case something important needs to be
12 broadcast during the time the national network programs
13 are on.
14 448 The programs amalgamate the weather,
15 road conditions, and local notices for both CBC Yukon
16 and Mackenzie radio networks originates in Yellowknife
17 with a correction for the time zones in the Yukon.
18 449 I dislike the cult of the personality
19 at CBC. I cannot listen to any program with Michael
20 Enright. Therefore, I am doubly, triply dismayed by
21 having This Morning tonight, and on Sunday three hours
22 of This Morning. I didn't listen to As It Happened as
23 long as Enright was there, but now it is my favourite
24 program.
25 450 I was hoping they would choose Ian
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1 Brown for Sunday morning. He is listenable. And I
2 like Averil Benoit, but I can't risk tuning in.
3 451 Another irritation is the distorting
4 of the invitation by the announcers of As It Happens to
5 stay tuned for the news and weather. What we get is
6 the news and a generic promo for Mackenzie network
7 radio programs. The weather would only be a recorded
8 forecast anyway.
9 452 If we are worried about the economy,
10 why does the CBC and the Mackenzie network require
11 operating out of two widely separated buildings?
12 Wouldn't there be savings in having it all in one? It
13 would save a trek for information-seekers.
14 453 I am opposed to TV advertising, and I
15 hoped that the savings resulting from closing the
16 Mackenzie network would go toward eliminating them.
17 But CBC TV is as guilty as anyone with their big
18 production promos for their programs. I think that
19 they should examine the French channel TV5, to see how
20 they show their promos: very spare and brief.
21 454 I would like to say I am not opposed
22 to native language programming. As I have requested
23 before, I would think that three hours, from 1305 to
24 1600, would be adequate. And that is if Mackenzie
25 network survives.
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1 455 I am sure that the local news and
2 programming will be assumed by the private radio
3 stations or the NCS CKLB stations and NCTV. I tried to
4 find out the cost of operating the CBC Mackenzie
5 network, but no one could provide it. The one who
6 could provide the numbers was in Toronto at a meeting.
7 456 Thank you.
8 457 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
9 much, Mr. Powless.
10 1535
11 458 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is Mr.
12 Ben McDonald.
13 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
14 459 MR. McDONALD: I should start out by
15 saying, by way of introduction, that my name is Ben
16 McDonald. I am the Co-Chairperson of Alternatives
17 North, and I am speaking on behalf of that
18 organization.
19 460 Alternatives North is a northern
20 social justice coalition comprised of labour, church
21 and environmental groups, dedicated to proposing policy
22 alternatives in the Northwest Territories. It is
23 affiliated to the Action Canada Network.
24 461 As an aside from my script here, the
25 organization thought at first that we should come and
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1 make a presentation to the CRTC, feeling that we would
2 be one of the few defenders of public broadcasting in
3 the North and in the country. But sitting here through
4 the presentations from all the rest of the presenters,
5 much of what I am going to say here is going to be
6 repetitive.
7 462 That being said, I will move into it
8 and try to get through it as quickly as possible.
9 463 Canadians need to hear as many
10 different voices as they can. We must hear diverse
11 ideas and extensive information from the widest range
12 of perspectives possible. It is the CBC which should
13 provide this forum for the ideas and views held by
14 Canadians. The CBC is not like other broadcasters, and
15 it shouldn't be. The CBC is, and must be, an
16 alternative.
17 464 A central function for the CBC is to
18 be educational in the broadest sense of the word. Its
19 best role, as difficult or as controversial as it may
20 be on occasion, is as a purveyor of new and unusual
21 ideas. We are not saying that the CBC should be a
22 soapbox for crackpots, although that may indeed be part
23 of its mandate, but it should be the primary forum by
24 which Canadians can hear challenges to the received
25 wisdom.
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1 465 Canadians need and deserve to hear
2 about today's story, but they also need to have it
3 grounded. Only broadcasters with reasonably unfettered
4 funding and high standards like the CBC can assume such
5 a dangerous role. For that reason, the CBC must be
6 given independence and be strengthened by the provision
7 of long-term and sufficient resources to act as what is
8 really a public information and cultural exchange for
9 Canadians.
10 466 Private broadcasters cannot speak
11 with a public voice. They also cannot be expected to
12 speak in the public interest. A public broadcaster,
13 free of the worry that they might offend advertisers
14 and specifically mandated to produce high quality
15 programming from a wide range of perspectives, can
16 fulfil this role. In fact, a politically independent
17 publicly funded broadcaster is probably the only form
18 of institution that could reasonably be expected to
19 fulfil this role, a role that is crucial to a healthy
20 democracy.
21 467 The North is a very small market, one
22 which is not likely to be able to support a wide range
23 of commercial broadcasting outfits in any foreseeable
24 future. In fact, the new Western Northwest Territories
25 which will come into existence on April 1st will have
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1 fewer inhabitants than an average small town in
2 Ontario, but we will live in a land incorporating
3 hundreds of thousands of square kilometres.
4 468 For northeners to be able to speak to
5 northerners, for northerners to be able to speak to
6 other Canadians, and for other Canadians to be able to
7 speak to us, a strong CBC, both nationally and
8 regionally, is essential.
9 469 There is little chance that any
10 entrepreneur is going to be willing to invest what
11 would be needed to get his or her signal into the
12 North, but there is virtually no chance that an
13 entrepreneur will invest much to develop northern
14 programming for broadcast either within the North or to
15 the rest of the country. The CBC's role as a regional
16 broadcaster, as well as a national, is therefore vital
17 to the North. It is at the same time an important
18 means by which the many peoples of the North can tell
19 and hear each other's stories. It is also the most
20 likely means by which northerners will be able to
21 produce their stories for telling to the rest of the
22 country.
23 470 The North needs a strong public
24 broadcaster, because it is not only a small market in
25 total but because it is also a very segmented market
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1 within itself. We have great differences in both
2 experiences and culture from one part of our territory
3 to the next. There are at least seven aboriginal
4 languages, as well as French and English, spoken by our
5 citizens. The residents of Fort Smith do not
6 experience life in the same way those living in
7 Tuktoyaktuk do, and even more significantly, no
8 northerner experiences life like a Torontonian does.
9 471 CBC North has a vital role to play in
10 this young land, helping to bring our divergent peoples
11 together. Just as importantly, however, CBC has a role
12 to play in helping to maintain the uniqueness of each
13 culture and language in the NWT. If children can hear
14 their language and see images of themselves on the
15 airwaves, their language and culture is legitimized and
16 strengthened. This is a laudable goal.
17 472 A critical role that CBC North has
18 played as a regional broadcaster in the North has been
19 with regard to its efforts in news and current affairs
20 programming. The CBC, both radio and television, is
21 the only way that people in our far flung communities
22 are kept informed of current affairs, especially those
23 which take place outside their community in the North.
24 473 There are commercial radio stations
25 which broadcast in Yellowknife and Hay River, but
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1 virtually all their news and current affairs
2 programming originates in Yellowknife. Only the CBC
3 has a truly regional infrastructure and focus. There
4 seems to be no private broadcaster waiting in the wings
5 to fill the void the cuts to CBC news and current
6 affairs programming has been creating.
7 474 Much of this presentation probably
8 reflects the broad support that exists for CBC radio.
9 CBC television, it seems, is not held in as high regard
10 by Canadians. Why is this? It seems obvious that what
11 distinguishes CBC radio from other stations and what
12 does not distinguish CBC television is advertising. We
13 believe that television should be given the chance to
14 act as a truly public broadcaster, funded to do a
15 proper job, and not required to use any of its
16 resources or energies selling advertising. Instead, a
17 reasonable level of long-term funding should be
18 provided.
19 475 Along with this support, however,
20 should be a clear mandate that the corporation is
21 required to continue to support high-quality Canadian
22 programming. A portion of such programming must be
23 regional in nature and must be produced within the
24 regions. This function would assist the development of
25 Canadian talent, as well as entertain and inform
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1 audiences.
2 476 The CBC has a critical role to play,
3 not only protecting Canadian culture from American
4 media conglomerates but also even promoting it in the
5 face of the daily barrage coming into our homes.
6 Private broadcasters are naturally reluctant to
7 produce, and then to show in prime time, Canadian
8 productions. It is cheaper, safer and easier to simply
9 buy American produced programming.
10 477 Although we acknowledge that
11 Canadians cannot be prevented from seeing and hearing
12 American programming, the CRTC should still ensure that
13 we have a choice; that we don't have to absorb
14 programming developed in a foreign country for the
15 lowest common denominator market because we have no
16 choice.
17 478 It is in the public interest to try
18 to improve the standards of media broadcasting
19 broadcast into our homes and a strong CBC, along with
20 other Canadian media companies mandated to make
21 available in prime time quality Canadian programs, is a
22 minimum.
23 479 In summary, the points we make are as
24 follows: A strong public broadcaster with stable,
25 long-term reasonable funding must be an integral part
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1 of any Canadian broadcasting system; and the North
2 needs a CBC to have a strong regional component so that
3 they can serve both as a window for northerners to look
4 at themselves and as a two-way window between the North
5 and the rest of the country and the world.
6 480 Before closing, I should state that
7 our organization made a conscious decision to avoid
8 discussing the ongoing labour problems at the CBC. We
9 didn't want current affairs to obscure the big picture.
10 We do want to make it clear, however, that considering
11 the cuts to the organization's budget over the past few
12 years, we consider it a wonder that it has taken the
13 workers as long as it has to take a stand.
14 481 We also believe it to be unfortunate
15 that the strike appears to be against management at the
16 corporation when it is fairly obvious that the
17 politicians hiding behind the CBC board are the real
18 cause of the strike.
19 482 Thank you for this opportunity to
20 express our thoughts.
21 483 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr.
22 McDonald.
23 484 MS PINSKY: Ms Marianne Maltby is the
24 next presenter.
25 485 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I think she
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1 may have left the room, so I think we will have to move
2 on.
3 486 MS PINSKY: Is Mr. John Bayly there?
4 487 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Well, John
5 Bayly has gone too, but he did ask me to read his
6 submission to you, if that is all right.
7 488 MS PINSKY: That is okay.
8 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
9 489 MS PETERS: This is the submission of
10 John Bayly.
11 490 It was the winter of 1967 in a place
12 called Great Whale River on the east coast of the
13 Hudson Bay that I first lay out on a caribou skin
14 gazing at the subarctic sky. Of course, the sky was
15 full of stars and sometimes a meteorite would streak
16 through the atmosphere.
17 491 Northern lights displays were as
18 spectacular there as they are here in Yellowknife.
19 Sometimes I would lie motionless and watch the heavens
20 scarcely blinking for an hour or two. I seldom saw an
21 airplane, and I never saw a satellite.
22 492 Thirty years later I still like to
23 lie out on a clear night under the stars. The sky is
24 no less spectacular in the 1990s than it was in the
25 sixties. There is always something new. Two planets
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1 in rare conjunction lit up the sky after Christmas.
2 Two years ago, for a whole winter, the comet Haley Bob
3 walked its way from east to west across the sky. Of
4 course, there are now more planes in the night sky and
5 satellites, like purposeful mites, hurry across the
6 heavens.
7 493 It is not common to see a dozen or
8 more in an hour. These mites, satellites, shower us
9 with communication, where 30 years ago there was almost
10 none. A simple satellite dish, like a catcher's mitt,
11 traps the signals as they pitch out of the heavens.
12 494 Satellite phones are beginning to
13 replace the wirebound and microwave-relayed systems.
14 495 Today we can receive whatever we want
15 on our TV screens and often a whole lot we would rather
16 not have. We have joined southern Canada in the super
17 station supermarket, with a channel for every taste and
18 a whole bunch more for those without much taste at all.
19 496 In the time between the beginning of
20 my star gazing and the present, Canada gave the North a
21 great gift. It was the CBC. Radio came first and then
22 TV, first delayed and in cans -- you could watch the
23 hockey game, but it was last Saturday's -- and later
24 relayed in seconds by satellite.
25 497 The CBC brought the rest of Canada to
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1 the North. It also allowed northern people, through
2 local and regional broadcasting, to learn about one
3 another. It allowed us in the North to inform
4 Canadians elsewhere what kind of a country this is and
5 what kind of a people we are.
6 498 Those last words aren't mine; they
7 are Justice Tom Berger's.
8 499 In letting the CBC into the Mackenzie
9 Valley Pipeline hearing room in the mid 1970s, and
10 insisting as part of the bargain that CBC broadcast
11 news summaries of the daily proceedings across the
12 North in half a dozen languages, it brought one of our
13 great national debates into every household in this
14 sparsely populated territory. Then the CBC passed that
15 information around the country in the form of news in
16 the only way it could possibly have been done in a
17 nation that spans five-and-a-half time zones.
18 500 It is because of the CBC that I was
19 able to watch the Quebec referendum results from
20 Iqaluit. It was because of the CBC news reports of
21 starvation in the Sudan that moved the people of
22 Arvagh, who knew what it is like to starve, to give
23 $40,000 from their municipal budget to feed the hungry.
24 501 I don't propose to tell you all the
25 things that I like and dislike about the CBC. I have
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1 been a listener and watcher for 50 years. I miss Max
2 Ferguson and Alan McPhie. I loved Gilmour's Albums. I
3 went to the Tommy Hunter concert in Inuvik a few years
4 ago. He is a Canadian icon to the people of the
5 Mackenzie Delta, by the way.
6 502 I like The National and As It
7 Happens. So, by the way, do a lot of people south of
8 the forty-ninth parallel.
9 503 I think part of what defines us,
10 whether I like it on a given day or not, is the
11 unbridled Canadian humour of the Air Farce, Codco, This
12 Hour Has 22 Minutes and Nancy White. Our comedians
13 tell us what kind of country this is and what kind of
14 people we are, whether we like to hear it or not.
15 504 A couple of years ago I was a guest
16 in a household in Fort Ray. In the evening, the couple
17 I was visiting had to go out. He had to go to a
18 community meeting and she was holding court as the
19 local justice of the peace. They asked me to tape the
20 TV program North of Sixty so they could watch it later.
21 I asked them why they wanted me to tape it for them.
22 It seemed clear to me that they were living the North
23 of Sixty story. They said what they liked was that
24 they saw themselves and their neighbours in the
25 program, and they knew and liked the fact that other
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1 Canadians were watching them too.
2 505 In Washington, D.C., in 1982, I found
3 myself at a conference with a group of other northern
4 Canadians. One of other speakers was Ralph Nadar, the
5 greater American consumer advocate. Mr. Nadar came up
6 to us over coffee and said: You Canadians are so lucky
7 to have a national public broadcasting system. In the
8 United States we sold all the rights to the commercial
9 broadcasters early on. Many thinking Americans, he
10 said, have been trying to get those rights back for
11 decades. Public broadcasting is a great treasure, a
12 national building asset, he said. The public
13 broadcaster can resist censorship, including
14 self-censorship, more effectively than the commercial
15 broadcaster. National public television and radio are
16 important. Guard them both and don't give them up.
17 506 Members of the Commission, don't let
18 us give them up. There is nothing to replace them.
19 Without CBC radio and television, we would be without a
20 trans-Canada sea to sea to sea to 49th parallel
21 windbreak to protect us from being drifted over by a
22 blizzard of TV and radio from the United States. The
23 satellite shower, I can watch on any clear evening
24 lying on my caribou skin on the north shore of the
25 Great Slave Lake.
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1 507 That's it.
2 508 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
3 509 MS PINSKY: Whoever just read Mr.
4 Bayly's statement, could you please state your name.
5 510 MS PETERS: My name is Ann Peters.
6 511 MS PINSKY: Thank you.
7 512 I would like to go back to Whitehorse
8 for a moment.
9 513 Is a Mr. Roger Rondeau there?
10 514 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: No, he is not
11 here.
12 515 MS PINSKY: Thank you.
13 516 Has Ms Marianne Maltby returned in
14 Yellowknife?
15 517 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: No, she
16 hasn't.
17 518 MS PINSKY: Is there anybody else?
18 Let's go first to Inuvik.
19 519 Is there anybody else in Inuvik who
20 would like to make a presentation?
21 520 I think that is a "no".
22 521 Is there anybody in Whitehorse?
23 522 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Is this going
24 to be it for people's chance? I think some think there
25 may be another chance tonight.
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1 523 MS PINSKY: We had not scheduled
2 anybody for this evening.
3 524 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: That is okay.
4 I think they thought there might be a chance tonight.
5 525 MS PINSKY: Again I will ask in
6 Whitehorse. Is there anybody there who would like to
7 make a presentation that hasn't already done so?
8 526 Is there anybody left in Yellowknife
9 who would like to make a presentation that has not?
10 527 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: All clear in
11 Yellowknife.
12 1550
13 528 THE CHAIRPERSON: I would like to
14 call the CBC.
15 REPLY / RÉPLIQUE
16 529 MS WILSON: Thank you, Commissioner
17 Grauer. My name is Marie Wilson. I am the Regional
18 Director of Radio and Television for CBC North. That
19 is a region which serves the Yukon and the Northwest
20 Territories, as well as a couple of regions we have not
21 heard from today, including Arctic Quebec and the James
22 Bay Region of Northern Quebec as well; and of course
23 the soon to be Nunavut Territory which will be formed
24 from the Northwest Territories.
25 530 I really want to thank the CRTC for
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1 making this opportunity for the North to participate in
2 your community consultations, and I especially want to
3 thank those northerners on the line -- and I hope you
4 can hear me -- who have made the effort to come out
5 today. I think it takes a particular commitment to do
6 it by telephone, where you don't have the benefit of
7 being in the same room with us. Thank you very much
8 for your comments.
9 531 I have taken many notes here today
10 and listened very carefully to all that you have said.
11 I very much appreciate your interest and your ownership
12 of the CBC, which of course belongs to all Canadians.
13 532 There are a couple of points which I
14 would like to speak to.
15 533 We will be following up to the
16 individuals to respond to any comments you have made.
17 But I have a couple of points of precision that might
18 be helpful.
19 534 The CBC North of course has been
20 affected by all the same challenges that affect all of
21 the regions of the CBC. We also have some unique ones
22 of our very own. We, like other parts of the CBC, have
23 to balance competing priorities and demands, but we
24 have to do that in a part of the country -- the top
25 one-third of all of Canada -- with far less resources
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1 than we used to have. That is complicated by very big
2 distances, very sparse populations and multiple
3 languages.
4 535 For anyone who may not be aware, we
5 actually do broadcast weekly in ten languages: English,
6 French and eight aboriginal languages. I say that, in
7 part, in reference to Audrea Wulf's comments about the
8 use of Slavey on North Beat. It is always very
9 difficult to balance language use in the North when we
10 have multiple audiences on any given broadcast.
11 536 We do have, though, 100 hours a week
12 in eight aboriginal languages, so we are doing our best
13 to produce as much as we can in the various languages
14 of the North.
15 537 The issue of signal coverage was also
16 mentioned a number of times here today. It would be
17 far too complicated for me to speak to in just a few
18 words, but it is one of our great challenges. We are
19 happy -- in response to Mr. Dent's comments about the
20 communities that have now grown to be over 500, we are
21 very glad that we will be able to take on that
22 responsibility. We will also continue to provide
23 support as best we can to those smaller communities
24 that we are not assuming direct responsibility for, in
25 the same way that we have in the past; which is
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1 basically on an as resources allow basis and in
2 response to emergencies as requested and on a recovery
3 basis.
4 538 In regard to the Radio Two service
5 that was mentioned a number of times, perhaps for the
6 Yukon the best solution there would be to pursue the
7 option that made that possible in Yellowknife. I know
8 there are very many satisfied Radio Two users in
9 Yellowknife.
10 539 Several people mentioned the cutbacks
11 to CBC North. I think it is important to acknowledge
12 that while we are a huge region of Canada -- we say it
13 is a great north but it needs editing -- we do receive,
14 because of our sparse population far more money from
15 the CBC per capita than any other region of the
16 country, given the geography and the incredible costs
17 of doing business there. We can't lose site of that.
18 540 We will certainly continue to do the
19 best we can with those resources, taking all of the
20 very useful comments from today into account.
21 541 I thank you all very much for your
22 participation and your suggestions.
23 542 THE CHAIRPERSON: Before we terminate
24 the teleconference link, I would like to thank all of
25 you, as well, who have come out to Inuvik, Yellowknife
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1 and Whitehorse. It is very important to our
2 deliberations, with respect to the licence renewal, to
3 hear from all Canadians; but in particular the unique
4 perspectives of those of you north of sixty are very
5 helpful, and I want to reiterate how much we appreciate
6 you taking the time.
7 543 I also want to remind everyone that
8 we will have a Public Notice going out at the end of
9 this month with respect to the May 25th hearing in
10 Hull, and the deadline for written submissions is April
11 30th. I invite anybody who has anything additional
12 they would like to say, or any other friends,
13 neighbours in the North, to please file a submission.
14 544 I think you all very much. Good
15 afternoon.
16 545 MS PINSKY: Perhaps all of those who
17 are present in the room who will be making a
18 presentation can join us at the table and take a seat.
19 546 In fact, we do have many seats
20 available, so anybody else who wants to take a seat at
21 the table is welcome.
22 --- Pause / Pause
23 PRÉSENTATION / PRESENTATION
24 547 MME PINSKY: Le prochain intervenant
25 est M. Maurice Morin.
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1 548 M. MORIN: Alors bonjour. Je suis le
2 président du conseil d'administration d'Oniric qui
3 regroupe des intervenants dont le but commun est de
4 créer un environnement qui promouvoit l'entreprenariat
5 chez les francophones de l'ouest canadien dans le
6 domaine des médias numériques.
7 549 Alors notre conseil d'administration
8 est composé de professionnels du monde des nouveaux
9 médias et du secteur de l'éducation provenant des
10 différentes provinces de l'ouest, que ce soit la
11 Colombie-Britannique, l'Alberta, la Saskatchewan ou le
12 Manitoba. Le territoire que couvre Oniric comprend
13 également le Yukon et les territoires.
14 550 Ce que je dois vous dire c'est que
15 plutôt que d'être une association, on est une
16 corporation de développement et d'après nos revenus on
17 se situerait parmi les premiers dix producteurs
18 indépendants de contenu canadien de langue française.
19 Tout cela se fait à partir de l'ouest et on se trouve à
20 créer de l'emploi pour environ 55 à 60 personnes -- du
21 moins c'est ce que reflètent nos activités de cette
22 année.
23 551 La Société Radio-Canada a joué un
24 rôle essentiel tout au long de l'histoire des
25 communautés des francophones de l'ouest dans le soutien
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1 au développement des communautés francophones, que ce
2 soit en fournissant des services d'informations, en
3 produisant des programmes culturels ou en procurant aux
4 francophones de ces régions un lieu d'expression et un
5 outil de rassemblement.
6 552 Alors si nous venons présenter notre
7 point de vue c'est que nos stratégies de développement
8 reposent sur trois éléments principaux qui
9 s'harmonisent avec la vision et le mandat élargi de
10 Radio-Canada dans nos régions.
11 553 Nous voulons, en effet, privilégier
12 la formation et l'éducation des jeunes de nos provinces
13 et territoires, particulièrement dans le domaine des
14 nouveaux médias, en vue d'assurer une relève qui sera à
15 même d'intervenir en région dans la préparation de
16 nouveaux contenus et la mise en place de technologies
17 répondant au besoin de nos communautés.
18 554 Fournir aux jeunes entrepreneurs
19 francophones de l'ouest des occasions de travailler et
20 de se perfectionner en français en nouveaux médias dans
21 un environnement professionnel alors que les occasions
22 d'emplois au sein des grandes institutions d'État
23 deviennent de plus en plus limitées. Ce sera aussi
24 pour eux l'occasion de développer des produits dans les
25 deux langues officielles du pays et pourquoi pas le
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1 faire à partir de l'ouest?
2 555 Finalement, permettre aux détenteurs
3 de droits d'auteurs du domaine culturel de diffuser ces
4 oeuvres dans les nouveaux médias. Alors les nouvelles
5 technologies en média numérique évoluent à une vitesse
6 étourdissante. On les perçoits comme la nouvelle voix
7 d'avenir pour la francophonie mondiale. Il ne faudrait
8 pas, cependant, que les responsables politiques et les
9 décisions du CRTC oublient l'histoire des médias et que
10 leur leadership s'en inspire.
11 556 Le premier ministre du Canada annonce
12 aujourd'hui, d'après les médias, le lancement de
13 l'année de la francophonie. Cette déclaration
14 politique nationale sera soulignée, notamment, par deux
15 événements dont le CRTC est en grande partie
16 responsable: la création d'un réseau national de la
17 chaîne française TVA et des radios communautaires
18 francophones à travers le pays -- et je parle des
19 radios communautaires de langue française qu'on peut
20 retrouver un peu partout, y compris ici en Alberta,
21 dans le nord de l'Alberta.
22 557 Alors, ce sont des événements
23 remarquables, voire même historiques, une influence
24 directe des technologies qui transforment notre paysage
25 audiovisuel et culturel. Mais regardons l'évolution
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1 qui nous a amenés à ces résultats.
2 558 Selon ma compréhension de vos
3 politiques et de la réglementation, depuis les trois
4 dernières décennies le CRTC s'est guidé dans ses
5 décisions sur deux grands principes: le droit des
6 Canadiens et Canadiennes des deux langues officielles à
7 un accès à la radio et à la télévision publique partout
8 au pays et le second principe énoncé avec l'avènement
9 de la câblodistribution canadienne est celui de l'accès
10 du citoyen au choix et singulièrement aux chaînes de
11 leur pays, une manière directe de privilégier l'accès à
12 un nouveau contenu canadien.
13 559 Or l'histoire nous montre que les
14 communautés francophones ont dû se battre pour que les
15 câblodistributeurs et les télédiffuseurs privés offrent
16 ces services en région et que les politiciens ne
17 respectent pas tout l'esprit de la loi sur la
18 radiodiffusion canadienne afin que la Société
19 Radio-Canada puisse être présente partout au Canada.
20 560 Aujourd'hui même on peut dire que les
21 communautés francophones voient encore une certaine
22 traînée de la patte et doivent revendiquer, localité
23 par localité, pour que ces engagements de base soient
24 respectés, une situation qui n'annonce rien de mieux
25 que de nouvelles batailles.
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1 561 Enfin, avec les réductions
2 budgétaires de la Société Radio-Canada, tout
3 professionnel de médias sait que les contraintes de
4 financement peuvent imposer des limites inacceptables à
5 la création originale et, à mon avis, c'est cela la
6 tragédie qui entraîne l'asphyxie financière de la
7 Société Radio-Canada.
8 562 A toute fin pratique, les membres du
9 CRTC doivent poser un regard lucide sur l'histoire des
10 communautés face à l'application des deux principes
11 directeurs qui les ont guidés au cours des dernières
12 décennies: l'accès à la radio et à la télévision doit
13 s'amarrer aux habitudes culturelles que nous souhaitons
14 encourager dans le développement et l'épanouissement
15 des communautés.
16 563 Le choix et l'accès à un choix
17 doivent être basés sur la qualité, le reflet, la
18 pertinence et la proximité du communicateur avec son
19 auditoire. Cette part d'influence et de pouvoirs que
20 vous exercez est tout aussi importante dans les
21 nouveaux médias -- par exemple, dans la position que
22 vous pourriez prendre face aux compagnies téléphoniques
23 ou les compagnies qui veulent profiter, finalement, des
24 nouvelles technologies dans le secteur sur le réseau
25 Internet -- il y a certainement beaucoup de place à ce
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1 niveau-là pour prendre des décisions qui vont
2 encourager le développement d'entreprises comme les
3 nôtres et puis ensuite elle est importante également
4 pour les médias traditionnels -- et doit jouer en
5 faveur d'un meilleur avenir mais, également, en tenant
6 compte des réussites du passé.
7 564 Alors c'est pourquoi l'enracinement
8 de Radio-Canada dans la communauté et sa présence
9 continue et renforcée dans nos régions sont
10 indispensables si la Société veut baser son
11 intervention, tel qu'elle se doit, sur une connaissance
12 approfondie de la spécificité, des intérêts et des
13 aspirations des francophones de l'ouest.
14 565 Alors, c'est avec plaisir et avec ces
15 espoirs que nous déposerons ce mémoire en appuyant le
16 renouvellement des licences de la Société Radio-Canada,
17 ici en Alberta, et dans les autres provinces et,
18 naturellement, dans les territoires, si le cas se
19 présentait.
20 566 Merci.
21 567 LA PRÉSIDENTE: Merci beaucoup
22 Monsieur Morin.
23 568 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is Ms
24 Dawn Green-Shelton.
25 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
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1 569 MS GREEN-SHELTON: Good afternoon.
2 My name is Dawn Green-Shelton, and I have never before
3 made a presentation of any kind to a commission or a
4 public meeting, but when I heard that the CRTC was
5 coming to Edmonton to hear Canadians' opinions on the
6 CBC, I felt really compelled to act.
7 570 First, I have a confession to make;
8 and that is that I am a CBC radio addict. It is
9 important that you know that my presentation will be
10 totally biased.
11 571 My radio is, quite simply, never
12 tuned to anything but CBC, and quite frankly there is
13 nothing else that is worth listening to.
14 572 I will speak to CBC radio
15 exclusively, because I watch almost no television.
16 573 I would guess that I am an acutely
17 average CBC listener. I am 37 years old. I am
18 married. I own my own home. I work fulltime. I have
19 two children, a university degree, and a keen interest
20 in learning.
21 574 For the past couple of weeks since I
22 signed up, I have asked several people who I like and
23 respect whether they listen to CBC, and the answers
24 were mixed: some listen and some don't; some don't like
25 the music; others don't like all the talking; some
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1 don't like the political viewpoint of the CBC.
2 575 But the those who do listen regularly
3 really like the newscasts, the music, the topical
4 updates on Canadian cultural issues, and the sheer
5 variety of the programming.
6 576 To me, the most interesting and the
7 most poignant observation from this exercise is that
8 not one person that I spoke to who is younger than me
9 listens to the CBC.
10 577 CBC radio is the only national
11 broadcaster when it comes to radio. I value the range
12 of the news that I get from St. John's to Iqaluit. The
13 reports have depth and substance. This is not what I
14 get from other radio stations, which is exactly why I
15 stopped listening to them.
16 578 I enjoy the regional nature of the
17 CBC. The local Radio One station does an excellent job
18 of promoting local cultural events and broadcasting
19 local talent. For weeks I have been reflecting on why
20 I am a CBC radio addict, and I have come to the
21 conclusion that it was because I was raised listening
22 to the CBC.
23 579 I grew up listening to Gilmour's
24 Albums, This Country in the Morning and As It Happens.
25 I am sure you know that are plenty of studies that
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1 indicate that if you are exposed to an art form -- for
2 example, opera -- when you are young, you are far more
3 likely to attend the opera as an adult.
4 580 So where is the next generation of
5 CBC listeners going to come from? Is there a way that
6 CBC can develop a station or something that would
7 target younger listeners?
8 581 The classical bent that CBC has turns
9 off the vast majority of younger listeners. What they
10 want to know is what is important to their lives. I
11 would suspect that their list of interests would not
12 include an in-depth report on the latest developments
13 in NORAD or the price of coffee in Antigua. These
14 young people do not see CBC radio as being relevant to
15 their lives in any way, and this must change.
16 582 The CBC has been masters of change.
17 Is a Radio Three possible? I certainly hope so, and
18 the future of CBC radio depends on it.
19 583 Thank you.
20 584 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Ms
21 Green-Shelton.
22 585 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is Mr.
23 Alain François.
24 PRÉSENTATION / PRESENTATION
25 586 M. FRANÇOIS: Bonjour. J'ai été
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1 invité comme à la dernière minute. C'est juste pour
2 parler de Radio-Canada.
3 587 On est une famille de trois. On
4 écoute la radio, on se réveille le matin en écoutant la
5 radio en français. On écoute les nouvelles en
6 français, on écoute la télévision en français. On aime
7 avoir les informations venant de Radio-Canada qui
8 viennent d'un océan à l'autre. On aime savoir ce qui
9 se passe de Vancouver jusqu'à Bathurst -- on a de la
10 famille un peu partout au pays.
11 588 Ce qui est intéressant avec
12 Radio-Canada c'est qu'ils nous tiennent informés et non
13 pas juste comme d'autres stations de radio ou de
14 télévision qui sont juste centrées sur elles-mêmes, sur
15 la petite ville. Ce qui est important avec
16 Radio-Canada c'est qu'ils nous tiennent informés de
17 tout ce qui se passe, autant température qu'événements
18 politiques et sociaux.
19 589 Ce qu'on aime aussi ce sont les
20 émissions pour les jeunes. J'ai un petit garçon, il
21 aime bien les émissions à la télévision faites ici
22 comme celles qui sont faites à Montréal, naturellement.
23 Quand je fais juste changer de poste, il me demande
24 souvent de retourner en français parce qu'il veut
25 écouter les émissions en français.
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1 590 Ce qui est bon et ce qui devrait
2 continuer c'est de voir des émissions faites ici pour
3 les jeunes pour essayer de motiver les francophones ici
4 à grandir en français et non pas perdre la langue,
5 parce que souvent ça va tellement vite. On le voit
6 souvent dans les écoles, ça ne prend pas de temps. Mon
7 épouse est enseignante donc elle le sait, elle l'a vu.
8 591 Donc, s'ils peuvent continuer à avoir
9 des émissions faites ici pour les jeunes comme ça ils
10 pourront garder leur langue maternelle. On espère
11 qu'on ne sera pas mis de côté ou oubliés. On va
12 sûrement travailler là-dessus -- à ce que Radio-Canada
13 soit toujours là, autant à la radio qu'à la télévision.
14 C'est tout.
15 592 Merci bien.
16 593 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr.
17 François.
18 594 MS PINSKY: Ms Caroline Nielsen is
19 the next presenter.
20 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
21 595 MS NIELSEN: Hi. I received a phone
22 call. I just want to say that I have been a CBC radio
23 fan for many years. It is disappointing to hear that
24 there is even a consideration that it would be no
25 longer a constant.
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1 596 Being originally from the Maritimes,
2 P.E.I specifically, it keeps me in touch from the real
3 people back home. Real people who I love to hear from
4 on the CBC, not only the Maritimes, but it is
5 interesting to hear from people in Vancouver right
6 across to Newfoundland. To hear from people in each
7 province makes us realize how alike we all are and how
8 we are different; also how different doesn't always
9 mean wrong.
10 597 The money spent is not wasted. It is
11 minor in comparison to other moneys spent in the
12 government. I feel strongly that we should continue to
13 support the CBC.
14 598 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Ms
15 Nielsen.
16 599 MME PINSKY: M. Yves Caron est le
17 prochain intervenant.
18 PRÉSENTATION / PRESENTATION
19 600 M. CARON: Bonjour. Moi aussi j'ai
20 vu qu'il y avait des audiences. On m'a invité à venir
21 donner une opinion à propos de Radio-Canada et de
22 l'influence que cette station peut avoir à la fois du
23 côté du travail que je fais et puis aussi du côté de la
24 communauté dans laquelle j'habite qui est la communauté
25 francophone ici en Alberta.
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1 601 Moi je viens du Québec mais ça fait
2 15 ans que j'habite en Alberta. J'ai deux enfants qui
3 ont 13 et 11 ans et je dirais que Radio-Canada est une
4 part importante pour eux pour garder leur langue, pour
5 apprendre d'abord le français qui est quand même leur
6 langue première même s'ils ont toujours habité ici en
7 Alberta.
8 602 Donc, les émissions pour enfants
9 c'était quelque chose de très important ainsi que la
10 lecture en français qu'on pouvait leur fournir et,
11 évidemment, le système scolaire qui est venu appuyer
12 tout cela.
13 603 Toujours est-il que Radio-Canada est
14 un élément très important de leur culture. Ça a donc
15 fourni à leur culture, ça leur a permis de voir le pays
16 qui est le Canada comme étant vraiment un pays qui
17 pouvait accueillir à la fois le français et l'anglais
18 comme deux langues officielles. Donc ça c'est une
19 chose.
20 604 De l'autre côté, je travaille depuis
21 plusieurs années avec des artistes. Je suis un
22 producteur d'événements artistiques en français, ici en
23 Alberta, et puis on monte des partenariats au niveau de
24 l'ouest parce qu'en français les marchés sont petits et
25 les artistes ont de la difficulté à faire des
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1 productions de haute qualité et réussir à les diffuser
2 seulement dans nos petites communautés dans l'ouest et
3 ils n'arriveraient pas à survivre de leur art.
4 605 Donc, on monte des partenariats et
5 Radio-Canada a été un partenaire sur plusieurs années
6 dans, entre autres, les événements de la chanson,
7 autour de la chanson française comme un diffuseur
8 important et on espère pouvoir toujours avoir
9 Radio-Canada comme partenaire lorsque c'est le temps de
10 diffuser la culture des gens d'ici et d'avoir,
11 évidement, du temps d'antenne qui vient d'ici pour
12 montrer la culture des gens d'ici.
13 606 C'est une difficulté parce que,
14 évidemment, c'est difficile pour nous d'être vus à
15 l'échelle nationale. On a plusieurs artistes qui
16 voudraient sortir puis être vus à l'échelle nationale,
17 soit à la télévision ou soit à la radio. Nous, on
18 reçoit beaucoup d'émissions qui portent sur les
19 artistes du Québec, et plus spécifiquement de Montréal,
20 mais nous on a de la difficulté à faire voir nos
21 artistes à l'extérieur et on espère qu'un jour
22 Radio-Canada pourra être vraiment le reflet mais dans
23 les deux sens.
24 607 Nous on voit beaucoup la production
25 artistique québécoise ici mais nos artistes ont
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1 toujours de la difficulté à se faire voir ou se faire
2 entendre par l'intermédiaire de Radio-Canada à travers
3 le pays et surtout -- moi ça fait 15 ans que je
4 travaille dans le domaine artistique ici en Alberta --
5 et maintenant on sent, depuis les quatre dernières
6 années, une émergence artistique très contemporaine,
7 très moderne qui aurait sa place pour concurrencer à
8 l'échelle nationale mais les artistes doivent déménager
9 pour joindre les rangs de l'industrie plus au Québec,
10 notamment, mais plusieurs restent ici et voudraient
11 rester ici et Radio-Canada est un des seuls canaux en
12 ce moment qu'on aurait pour être diffusé et on espère
13 que dans les renouvellements de licences -- j'imagine
14 qu'on est ici pour ça, je n'ai jamais participé à des
15 audiences du CRTC comme ça -- mais on espère que ce
16 canal-là va pouvoir être offert dans l'avenir.
17 608 On a entendu parler du Canal des arts
18 qui semblait dire qu'on pourrait permettre à des
19 producteurs indépendants de proposer des projets ici et
20 qu'ils seraient diffusés à travers ce Canal des arts.
21 En ce moment c'est très difficile pour un producteur
22 d'événements d'avoir des ententes avec Radio-Canada et
23 de pouvoir avoir des licences de diffusion des
24 productions artistiques faites ici et on espère que,
25 dans l'avenir, ce sera possible que ça se fasse plus
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1 facilement que présentement.
2 609 C'est un peu le message que j'avais à
3 livrer. Évidement, au nom des artistes qu'on
4 représente, au nom des productions artistiques qu'on
5 fait, on appuie, évidement, le renouvellement de
6 licence de Radio-Canada.
7 610 Merci.
8 611 LA PRÉSIDENTE: Merci beaucoup,
9 Monsieur Caron.
10 612 M. CARON: Merci.
11 613 MME PINSKY: Juste pour préciser
12 c'est que ce n'est pas exactement une audience publique
13 par rapport au renouvellement. On est ici pour une
14 consultation publique sur les questions générales du
15 mandat du CBC-SRC, et cetera, et à la fin du mois de
16 mars on va annoncer la procédure pour le renouvellement
17 des licences du SRC donc, si vous voulez, vous pouvez
18 déposer une intervention écrite avant le 30 avril.
19 614 The next presenter is Ms Alison
20 Dinwoodie.
21 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
22 615 MS DINWOODIE: Thank you for this
23 opportunity to speak about the CBC. I want to be one
24 of, I hope, many people who are making up a strong
25 voice to make sure that we are heard for CBC radio.
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1 616 I am one of the probably few people
2 who don't own a television, and I never have done. So
3 I am not addressing television. But some of the
4 general comments probably apply to it. I am going to
5 talk about radio.
6 617 I think you have probably heard a lot
7 of the statements that I am going to make, but perhaps
8 the slow dripping of water on the hard stone of
9 government might get some action.
10 618 CBC is a public broadcasting service
11 and it must therefore be funded adequately by the
12 government. I am very tired about the constant whine
13 about cutting taxes, and there should be more
14 commitment to putting taxpayers' dollars to the
15 services that Canadians really value.
16 619 We have seen some dollars coming back
17 to Health and Social Services because of all the
18 outcry, but services which are most frequently
19 identified as Canada's prime assets are the CBC and its
20 national parks. Both of these have been starved of
21 essential dollars for the last several years. This
22 must be reversed. There must be no more cuts to the
23 CBC.
24 620 The CBC administration and
25 programming must be independent of government
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1 manipulation and free of private sector influence.
2 Media are dangerously concentrated in near monopoly
3 hands, as can already been seen by the brainwashing by
4 the right wing publications and pundits on cutting
5 taxes.
6 621 We hear nothing about cutting taxes.
7 We hear a certain amount services required, but people
8 don't seem to be able to put the two together. This is
9 going to become even more important in the coming
10 century when power is increasingly being concentrated
11 in very few hands.
12 622 The public has a right to freedom of
13 information, and that means letting different views be
14 aired and not just government propaganda or private
15 industry's vested interests. There must be different
16 points of view held.
17 623 One example of the way we are heading
18 is when you get the Premier of Alberta complaining to
19 the University that they are not promoting his ideas.
20 I think we are going for a very dangerous situation
21 unless a really free radio can be maintained.
22 624 The government should not abrogate
23 its duties for funding to private industry. One of the
24 joys and the qualities of CBC is that it doesn't carry
25 these intensely annoying advertisements which totally
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1 destroy the listening experience.
2 625 So I would plead that we continue to
3 have a radio that does not have ads interrupting
4 everything.
5 626 CBC radio is a talk show, and there
6 is nothing else out there for Canadians. You can
7 listen at any time of the day, more or less, to any
8 sort of music but only on CBC can you hear informed
9 discussion of events, both across the country,
10 regionally and locally, plus many other interesting
11 talks.
12 627 All these aspects are essential to
13 give Canadians a proper perspective on what is
14 happening in their country. We must have a continued
15 source of informed discussion, which is available to
16 Canadians, as I say, locally and in the distant parts
17 of the far north, or wherever.
18 628 I am not mentioning any specific
19 programs, because I think most of them have already
20 been mentioned. But it says a lot for CBC that they
21 have so many high quality programs, or perhaps maybe
22 one can qualify and say they had many good programs.
23 With all the cutbacks, I am afraid the quality is
24 deteriorating.
25 629 The talk of centralizing the news I
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1 think will be nothing but a disaster. The technicians'
2 strike has been a good demonstration of the drop in
3 listenability, if you like, when there is no good
4 regional coverage. They have been trying to do what
5 they can to cover it, but it is definitely not adequate
6 at the present time.
7 630 Western Canada has its own interests.
8 These have nothing to do with eastern events, and vice
9 versa. Yes, we want national programs where you can
10 hear what is happening in Newfoundland or B.C., but we
11 don't want to have it mixed up with all the daily news.
12 631 So we do need local and regional
13 programs for the listening public.
14 632 CBC commissioning of concerts, plays
15 and other events is essential for promoting Canadian
16 culture and identity. This wide variety, which is
17 unmatched and unmatchable by any other source, gives
18 Canadians opportunities and exposure to the vivid life
19 of our nation.
20 633 So I would say long live radio arts.
21 634 CBC radio plays an important role in
22 the daily living for many people: blind people or
23 elderly people who can't watch television; truck
24 drivers on the road; housewives doing the ironing;
25 workers in repetitive jobs; if you are driving to and
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1 from work. You turn on the radio and you have a friend
2 to listen to help you through the daily drudgery and
3 loneliness.
4 635 People can also contribute in the
5 phone-in shows. They feel that they are involved, that
6 the radio show belongs to them. And so undubiously
7 you can absorb all sorts of fascinating bits of
8 information that you would never dream of listening to
9 deliberately. Politicians and executives are probably
10 too busy to listen to radio, so they really have no
11 understanding of this mine of information and enjoyment
12 that is out there. Radio is everybody's friend.
13 636 Finally, radio is an essential
14 communication in emergencies. Other services may be
15 non-functioning, but radio can usually transmit
16 essential and timely instructions and information.
17 Even if it is just telling you what the road conditions
18 are like. You don't really care what is happening out
19 on the Ontario roads, but you do want to know what is
20 happening on Highway 16.
21 637 I think I was particularly impressed
22 by Peter Gzowski's treatment of the Manitoba flood.
23 This gave a really heartfelt experience to everybody
24 across the country.
25 638 While there was a sympathetic
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1 treatment of the ice storm, I didn't get the same
2 feeling of everybody being involved. Again, I think
3 this was because we were seeing the slow slide to
4 mediocrity of all of the services caused by downsizing.
5 639 As I say, radio, and the public radio
6 that you can depend on, is an essential public service
7 in emergencies.
8 640 CBC radio was doing a good job, but
9 without proper long-term funding it won't be able to
10 carry on. It has to be able to provide an essential
11 public service in the future, provided the rot hasn't
12 got too far. It is so easy to destroy something that
13 has taken years to build up.
14 641 I plead with the CRTC to make sure
15 that this doesn't happen.
16 642 I find it kind of pathetic that the
17 Prime Minister is so insecure that he penalizes a fine
18 institution because of petty vendettas. I gather that
19 this is one of the main causes of some of the really
20 hard cutbacks in the CBC.
21 643 Canadians deserve better, and I hope
22 that the CRTC makes the necessary recommendations for
23 the CBC to continue doing its job into the next
24 century.
25 644 Thank you for this opportunity to
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1 speak.
2 645 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Ms
3 Dinwoodie.
4 646 MS PINSKY: Ms Hazel Wilson is the
5 next presenter.
6 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
7 647 MS WILSON: Thank you for this
8 opportunity. I have been waiting all afternoon because
9 of a mishap in communication.
10 648 I too support the need for public
11 broadcasting, and I guess I am not saying anything new
12 that you have not heard this afternoon, but maybe in a
13 different way.
14 649 I urge the CRTC to protect the CBC
15 from the many influences that are impinging adversely
16 on its operations. In doing so, I hope you can
17 convince the government that there are many of us who
18 consider public broadcasting an essential service that
19 should be supported, both politically and financially.
20 650 There are factors that impinge
21 adversely on operations. The first is lack of
22 finances.
23 651 Please inform the government that CBC
24 needs more funds if it is to fulfil its mandate. For
25 the past month or more I have been deprived of many of
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1 the television and radio programs that I depend upon
2 for information, discussion and insight. For some time
3 local news and other local programs have been reduced
4 due, in large part, to fewer staff. The plans to
5 centralize radio and television news has already
6 affected radio news coverage, to radio's loss and our
7 loss.
8 652 The CRTC needs to ensure the
9 independence of CBC radio and television.
10 653 The second adverse influence is the
11 current ideology that privatization is the answer to
12 all our ills. Canada has been built on the belief that
13 public leadership is effective in reaching long-term
14 goals. Public leadership is committed to the public
15 good and not to market values. No aspect of the CBC
16 should be privatized.
17 654 The third influence is political
18 ideology. A public broadcasting system should be
19 insulated from political considerations. Currently,
20 the CBC is supposed to be at arm's length from the
21 government, but the Prime Minister's responsibility to
22 appoint the president and the board of directors
23 suggests and provides the opportunity for political
24 interference. It seems that the time has come to
25 structure the CBC organization so that the president
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1 and board of directors resemble a crown corporation and
2 are responsible to Parliament.
3 655 Fourth is advertising influence.
4 Please, no advertising on CBC radio, and decrease the
5 dependency of television on advertising as a source of
6 revenue. Viewers are subjected to far too much that is
7 meaningless, some of it incomprehensible and most of it
8 a waste of time.
9 656 The need for change. I understand
10 the CBC is considering expansion and change. Change is
11 necessary as times change, but new services should have
12 their own funding. They should not be developed at the
13 expense of current programs. We have already
14 experienced considerable reduction in local services,
15 and just recently CBC announced reduction in the number
16 of foreign correspondents reporting from around the
17 world. Where else are we going to get the knowledge of
18 the world that is provided by foreign correspondents?
19 657 As you can see, I am an elderly
20 woman. I am a CBC listener and viewer. I listen to
21 CBC radio before I get out of bed in the morning, and
22 it is the last thing I listen to at night and perhaps
23 during the middle of the night. I also watch selected
24 CBC and Newsworld programs.
25 658 Please protect the existence and the
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1 integrity of CBC.
2 659 Thank you.
3 660 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
4 much.
5 661 MME PINSKY: La prochaine
6 intervenante c'est Mmm Lisette Villeneuve.
7 PRÉSENTATION / PRESENTATION
8 662 MME VILLENEUVE: Bonjour.
9 L'Association canadienne française de l'Alberta est
10 heureuse de comparaître devant vous aujourd'hui pour
11 participer à votre consultation concernant le
12 renouvellement du permis d'exploitation de la Société
13 Radio-Canada.
14 663 Permettez-nous, tout d'abord, de vous
15 rappeler qu'il y a un peu plus de 50 ans vos
16 prédécesseurs acceptaient notre demande de permis
17 d'exploitation d'une radio française en Alberta. A
18 cette époque, l'ACFA se lançait donc dans la grande
19 aventure de la radio. Nous avons vendu CHFA à la
20 Société Radio-Canada en 1974. Vous comprendrez que
21 notre attachement à nos institutions de communications
22 de langue française sont à la mesure de notre soutien à
23 la cause de la survie française dans l'ouest.
24 664 Plus de 178 500 personnes parlent le
25 français et l'anglais dans notre province.
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1 Contrairement à beaucoup d'idées reçues, la Société
2 Radio-Canada a donc en Alberta un public croissant qui
3 a soif de la culture française.
4 665 La création cette semaine d'un
5 secrétariat aux affaires francophones par le
6 gouvernement de l'Alberta vient témoigner de cet
7 intérêt accru. C'est pourquoi les services de
8 Radio-Canada sont si essentiels pour nous. Au-delà des
9 distances qui nous séparent et qui constituent à la
10 fois un attrait et un obstacle à surmonter au Canada,
11 le défi de faire voyager la langue française est
12 devenu, au fil des ans, un défi que nous relevons
13 chaque jour avec succès.
14 666 C'est pourquoi nous saluons les
15 initiatives de la Société Radio-Canada en matière de
16 diffusion d'émissions telles que Tournée d'Amérique et
17 L'Accent francophone. Il nous semble que c'est une
18 orientation à laquelle la Société Radio-Canada doit
19 accorder plus d'énergie et plus de ressources.
20 667 La contribution des stations
21 régionales se doit d'être plus importante et pour cela
22 les budgets de ces stations doivent être augmentés.
23 668 Les compressions budgétaires de la
24 Société Radio-Canada ont sérieusement affecté nos
25 stations. Les artisans et artisanes de la Société
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1 Radio-Canada font un travail colossal et nous tenons à
2 leur rendre hommage aujourd'hui car leurs moyens sont
3 limités, particulièrement aux réseaux français, et ils
4 font preuve d'un grand dévouement.
5 669 La Société Radio-Canada doit aussi
6 absolument conserver ses stations régionales dans
7 toutes les provinces de l'ouest. Nous nous opposons
8 vigoureusement à tout projet de fusion ou de
9 remplacement des stations par des bureaux.
10 670 Toute diminution des services est
11 inacceptable. Le mandat de la Société Radio-Canada est
12 de desservir toute la population canadienne de façon
13 équitable dans les deux langues officielles.
14 671 Je voudrais d'ailleurs signaler ici
15 l'importance pour la Société Radio-Canada d'améliorer
16 ses services à Calgary. Nos concitoyens de langue
17 anglaise ont vu leur service être rétabli après
18 compressions budgétaires.
19 672 En raison du conflit de travail à la
20 RSC, nous devons nous contenter de bulletins nouvelles
21 de Montréal comme le Montréal ce soir.
22 673 Nous ne pouvons que constater, comme
23 le font d'ailleurs les citoyens vivant en région au
24 Québec, l'omniprésence du contenu montréalais en onde.
25 674 Nous joignons donc notre voix à celle
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1 des autres francophones du pays pour souligner une plus
2 grande présence de toute la francophonie canadienne
3 dans ces émissions. Nous demandons donc au CRTC
4 d'exiger de la Société Radio-Canada la création de
5 comités aviseurs chargés de faire des recommandations
6 au conseil d'administration de la Société Radio-Canada.
7 675 Il est important que la Société
8 Radio-Canada soit dotée d'un budget pluriannuel mais il
9 faut aussi nous assurer que les sommes versées
10 répondent à des priorités.
11 676 La Société Radio-Canada nous consulte
12 régulièrement sur sa programmation, sur notre
13 satisfaction par rapport à ses services, mais nous
14 voyons trop rarement nos préoccupations faire l'objet
15 de suivi concret.
16 677 Il ne s'agit pas ici de s'ingérer
17 dans la politique journalistique de Radio-Canada, mais
18 plutôt de créer un mécanisme permanent pour s'assurer
19 d'un canal de communications directes avec le conseil
20 d'administration.
21 678 Nous sommes confiants qu'avec la
22 participation de la Société Radio-Canada et de ses
23 dirigeants nous pouvons créer un comité qui
24 constituerait un forum de discussions important pour
25 notre société d'État.
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1 679 La Société Radio-Canada envisage
2 toujours de nouvelles entreprises de programmation, par
3 exemple l'amélioration des services aux francophones
4 hors Québec, pouvait-on lire dans le document Mission,
5 Valeurs, Principes et Objectifs. Il est temps de
6 passer de la parole aux actes.
7 680 Nous sommes très inquiets des rumeurs
8 de privatisation de la Société qui épisodiquement
9 refont surface. Soyons clairs: la société canadienne
10 a besoin de la Société Radio-Canada.
11 681 Je reprendrai ici les mots de la
12 chancelière de l'Université de l'Alberta: nous n'avons
13 pas les moyens, comme société, de nous priver de la
14 Société Radio-Canada.
15 682 Merci de m'avoir écoutée.
16 683 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Madame
17 Villeneuve.
18 684 MS PINSKY: Is there anyone else in
19 the room who would like to make a presentation?
20 --- No response / Pas de réponse
21 685 THE CHAIRPERSON: We will take a
22 five-minute break and see if there is anyone else.
23 --- Recess at 1630 / Suspension à 1630
24 --- Upon resuming at 1640 / Reprise à 1640
25 686 THE CHAIRPERSON: Please proceed.
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1 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
2 687 MR. BALCON: Good afternoon. My name
3 is David Balcon. I am appearing this afternoon. I was
4 originally scheduled in the other room, but I thank you
5 for hearing me here. Maybe it is a little more
6 appropriate that I am here, because some of my remarks
7 will deal with a couple of the CBC people who are here
8 in the room.
9 688 And I am not trying to terrify them.
10 There are good things that I am going to say about
11 them.
12 689 A little bit of background. I
13 currently have a split personality in one sense,
14 because I have two businesses, one of which is survey
15 market research, the other is film production. The
16 independent film production industry in Alberta has
17 been on tenterhooks for a while, so a lot of us have
18 had to do other things.
19 690 I am not exactly moonlighting,
20 because I started my career almost 35 years ago as a
21 producer of and working at CBC television in Toronto.
22 I went to university and came out. There weren't very
23 many jobs in the creative sector in the early 1970s
24 that were outside of institutions. I spent two years
25 at TVOntario and then was asked to come to the CRTC in
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1 the days of Harry Boyle and Pierre Juneau.
2 691 So from 1972 to 1980 I was a staff
3 member in the Research Branch of the CRTC and lived
4 through the process of the first CBC renewal hearing
5 that was ever held in public and was part of crafting
6 that decision with the Commissioners, of course, and
7 staff that suggested maybe the CBC should remodel
8 itself rather radically. It became known as the PBS
9 North model. I am not selling that model here today.
10 692 I was also a staff member working on
11 another committee, the Boyle Committee, which looked at
12 the question of whether the CBC was a subversive agency
13 in promoting separatist ideas in Quebec. Some of these
14 themes are coming back again, as we have heard some
15 suspicions in Ottawa that some controls are being put
16 on CBC journalism.
17 693 I left Ottawa and went to Montreal
18 for two years at the National Film Board, and then
19 moved out to Alberta in 1982 and have lived here ever
20 since. For the last 15 years I was doing consulting
21 with the three Prairie provinces to help them set up
22 film development agencies and to set up the cultural
23 industries that are beginning to flourish.
24 694 One of the most frustrating elements
25 that you are aware of coming from Vancouver -- although
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1 things are a little healthier in B.C. than other
2 places -- has been the inability for regional producers
3 to access the decision-making processes in particularly
4 the public network as it began to hive off pieces,
5 consolidate and redirect the network in the Toronto
6 directions. Wherever there were opportunities to
7 develop as independents in partnership with the CBC, it
8 was always at the instigation of a strong regional
9 director who, within the constraints that the CBC had
10 at the time, was able to do something for those
11 industries.
12 695 We had seen that in Winnipeg. There
13 was quite a flourishing of activity during the 1980s.
14 So in Winnipeg and similarly in Saskatchewan with
15 Minzines(ph) and several other small production
16 companies, to the point that Saskatchewan's independent
17 production sector today is larger than Alberta's. Ten
18 years ago it was considerably in the opposite
19 direction.
20 696 We in Alberta have suffered two
21 things. We lost a film development agency a couple of
22 years ago, and we have seen the private broadcasters
23 retreating from their ability to license independent
24 productions, other than large scale dramas. Therefore,
25 small independent or medium sized independents who do
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1 primarily documentaries or other forms of television
2 have had to struggle, and only recently a glimmer of
3 hope has arrived in the CBC's appointment of some
4 regional directors in western Canada, one of whom,
5 Joan Novak, who has taken over Alberta, and within the
6 constrains has begun to not make promises but to work
7 with the industry an to help us develop and make
8 connections back in Toronto and develop licences and
9 such.
10 697 The other initiative is on the SRC,
11 the CBC French network side, and Lionel Bonneville, who
12 is also here. I am involved in a co-production with a
13 Vancouver producer on a documentary, and he has gone to
14 the network to squeeze even access to Telefilm
15 envelopes, which you know is a very difficult situation
16 for regional producers, because most CBC regional
17 managers cannot access those envelopes of money which
18 therefore make substantial productions possible.
19 698 A similar case: the same project we
20 are doing with Lionel on SRC, Murray Wilson has
21 acquired for services for CBC North, again, another
22 service that is so strapped for cash and resources that
23 it makes it very difficult to work with independents.
24 But the attempts are there to do it.
25 699 I could go on for hours obviously,
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1 but I won't. I will wrap up now with the one pledge
2 that I would hope you could take back to your
3 colleagues in Ottawa, and I will be putting it in the
4 ear of a couple that I know personally: Joan
5 Pennefather and a few others that I have worked with
6 over the years. That is, the CBC network must become
7 programmed from the regions as well as a national core.
8 In other parts of the country we need to see decisions
9 made across the country with regional directors able to
10 access Telefilm windows or envelopes of funds, national
11 network windows for actually broadcasting programs, and
12 ultimately a balance of the national service being
13 regionally reflective, which is its mandate, and with a
14 strong core of national programming.
15 700 All of this is part of a redesign
16 that many people have various ideas on how to redesign
17 the CBC. But it is essentially making programs that
18 Canadians will watch and making those programs that
19 reflect the reality of all of Canada and not just a
20 narrow sense of the country as we have often seen it.
21 701 Thank you very much. I will answer
22 any questions that you may have.
23 702 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr.
24 Balcon. I don't think we have any questions for you,
25 but I appreciate you taking the time to come here
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1 today.
2 703 MS PINSKY: Ms Lynn Rubizna.
3 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
4 704 MS RUBIZNA: Good afternoon. How
5 much time do I have? Two minutes?
6 705 MS PINSKY: You have ten minutes.
7 706 MS RUBIZNA: Thank you. I appreciate
8 you fitting me in. I couldn't get through on the
9 telephone to you for the whole week. We tried even one
10 day, 24 hours, some of us teachers to get through to
11 you, but we couldn't get through to you.
12 707 We appreciate you coming to Edmonton
13 and welcome you to our city. We are known as the city
14 with a big heart. By that, I mean with strong
15 community spirit and community involvement.
16 708 We feel we very much need the CBC,
17 both our radio and our television local and national,
18 because in the west, even though we don't have the
19 population, we do have great need to have a station
20 like the CBC that has high standards for reporting and
21 keeping the community involved and also keeping us
22 abreast of what is happening. We don't get enough
23 local reporting any more. Everything is globalizing to
24 such a fast effect that people are living in great
25 fear, because they really don't know what they can do
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1 positively in their communities any more.
2 709 I will give you an example. Just
3 last week CBC radio, 740 AM, interviewed an RCMP
4 officer from Saskatchewan who spent four years of his
5 life tracking down a man who had 27 false names -- I
6 forget the name for having a false name. He had 27
7 aliases, sorry. He was a child abuser, both in
8 Europe -- Interpol had a big track record on him. He
9 was in an Abbotsford jail for nine months here but
10 because his alias kept changing, it was hard to track
11 him down and put him behind bars now pretty well
12 permanently. He has come under the Violent Offenders
13 Act now, so he can be kept in jail indefinitely, as
14 long as he is viewed as a danger. He has been abusing
15 children for so many years now, both in Europe, in
16 Canada and in the United States.
17 710 This is just one example where CBC is
18 letting us know the positive things that are happening
19 in our community, the wonderful jobs that our police
20 are doing to break up some of the paedophile rings and
21 to help children; for example, the police in Calgary
22 and Edmonton who are helping children get off the
23 streets from prostitution, and to stop the abuses in
24 this country. It is criminal. Not enough is being
25 done to stop child abuse.
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1 711 As a teacher and tutor myself -- and
2 I am here speaking for other teachers in the city and
3 other French Canadian and regular English-speaking
4 families. They have all told me that they are very
5 concerned because their children are all encouraged to
6 join gangs today.
7 712 As a tutor right now, fulltime, I
8 found out about two children that I know in the city, a
9 boy aged 15 and a girl aged 14, who have joined gangs
10 since Christmas. The little girl involved is already
11 in jail. She has only been part of this gang since
12 Christmas, and she is already in jail.
13 713 The reason we need good
14 programming -- these children are being influenced by
15 the very extremely angry, hate-filled music that they
16 are listening to on the other stations today. CBC
17 doesn't do that. We baby boomers appreciate having the
18 variety that is on CBC for music, the wonderful
19 concerts they broadcast for us across this country to
20 keep us abreast of what is going on in different parts
21 of the country, as far as concerts, both classical and
22 non-classical; the beautiful inspirational music that
23 they play on radio throughout the week; and the famous
24 interviews that they have that make a real difference
25 in Canada. I mentioned about the RCMP officer.
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1 714 We would like them to carry other
2 high-quality art programs. We find there is a bit of a
3 stress now, especially on CBC national television, on
4 sports. That doesn't mean we can't have sports. We
5 just think the stress is too strong on sports. The
6 coverage during the Olympics is 24 hours instead of
7 just showing us the highlights. I think they could
8 certainly cut back on some of the extravagance that
9 they do during the Olympics, compared to the United
10 States and other countries, and put more money into
11 local programming that would benefit our teens
12 especially, who, as I say, are being extremely
13 influenced by gangs. We need something to counter this
14 influence in our community, and we think the CBC has a
15 mandate to keep us at leat posted on what is going on.
16 715 They do a much better job usually.
17 We would like to see them get a little bit more
18 involved in investigative reporting, which they don't
19 seem to have the time right now because of the severe
20 cutbacks. We would like to see them get more of our
21 tax money so that the workers of the CBC do not live in
22 fear of losing their security.
23 716 If they are going to do a good
24 quality job for the citizens of this country, which we
25 expect, they can't be everything to everybody. We want
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1 them to do the best they can for us in terms of the
2 important things which keep a community together: the
3 news of what is happening so we can keep our children
4 safe, and stop this abuse of our children.
5 717 These children are so angry today
6 because they are victims of so much abuse. Just to
7 look at the kind of music they listen to and the anger
8 in their faces scares me, and I am wondering where it
9 is going to lead. It is certainly not going to be a
10 positive influence in their own lives.
11 718 The reason that we as Canadians
12 respect the CBC so much is because they are willing to
13 cover things that other stations are not willing to
14 cover; important news, not the sex scandal in the
15 United States for 24 hours a day, which happened on CBC
16 news, since the Pope's visit in Cuba, all the way down
17 up until now almost. The coverage has been so intense.
18 What do we have to know all those details for of what
19 is going on in the United States political realm as far
20 as their sexual exploits?
21 719 I don't know what that is going to
22 help Canadians with.
23 720 As a concerned teacher and tutor of
24 many children, and personally involved with many
25 families in this city, we see a real importance that
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1 the CBC can make a real difference in our lives as it
2 has in the past when I was growing up. It always
3 covered local concerts and things and made the children
4 in the community feel important; that there was
5 something positive that they could do in their lives,
6 not the negative things like joining gangs today that
7 is the direction they are being pushed in.
8 721 I think it has been proven already,
9 because of the interviews that CBC has done of a lot of
10 the police working across the country with families and
11 citizens, that a lot of good can happen from CBC
12 broadcasts to stop the child abuse that is going on.
13 If we all work together, the media -- especially the
14 Canadian media, which is the CBC -- with the community,
15 we can make this country and the future of this country
16 a lot brighter than it seems to be going in right now.
17 722 This globalization and this severe
18 angry, hate-filled kind of music that they are exposed
19 to every day really bothers me. I know it is not doing
20 anything good for their blood pressure or for their
21 outlook on life.
22 723 CBC has been successful in involving
23 children in all kinds of concerts and communities.
24 This year alone there are many involved in concerts
25 that they would never have had a chance to be involved
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1 in if it wasn't for CBC telling the community, helping
2 the community to realize the importance of getting
3 behind these children in a lot of their activities,
4 whether it be sports activities or cultural.
5 724 And especially helping with the
6 French language and other languages, CBC has always
7 been there to show the positiveness of all the cultures
8 in this country. It has done a wonderful job of
9 binding us together and we want to see it continue. We
10 want them to get the extra funding they need to do the
11 job they need to do and feel that they are secure in
12 their jobs.
13 725 We don't want to see too many of
14 these kinds of situations like Terry Milewsky
15 happening. Our children don't understand. Even we
16 baby boomers don't understand really why he was
17 dismissed, what really happened there, what the reasons
18 were. A lot of things are unanswered, and Canadians
19 are confused here. These things should be cleared up.
20 After all, the taxpayers are paying for this news. If
21 the man did something wrong, we would like to know what
22 it was he did wrong and why they felt he had to be
23 dismissed. We just feel we have been kept in the dark
24 on these kinds of things.
25 726 That is what we appreciate with CBC.
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1 It is usually really very frank and open with the
2 public about what it is doing.
3 727 Outside of too much stress on sports,
4 especially non-Canadian sports, and a little bit too
5 much stress on the political scandals in the United
6 States, we think the CBC can go back to doing a
7 wonderful job for all of us, and especially in our
8 communities, make a real difference.
9 728 Thank you very much for your time.
10 729 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
11 much.
12 730 MS PINSKY: I believe those are all
13 the presenters that we have for today.
14 731 I'm sorry, there is the CBC.
15 732 THE CHAIRPERSON: The CBC.
16 RÉPLIQUE / REPLY
17 733 M. RENÉ FONTAINE: Merci, Madame
18 Grauer. Je m'appelle René Fontaine et je suis le
19 directeur de la radio française pour la région des
20 Prairies.
21 734 Je tiens à vous remercier de
22 l'occasion que vous nous avez donnée aujourd'hui
23 d'entendre les propos et les commentaires de plusieurs
24 de nos auditeurs, nos auditrices, nos téléspectateurs
25 et nos téléspectatrices.
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1 735 Je tiens aussi à remercier les
2 présentateurs de cette occasion qu'ils nous donnent et
3 des propos qu'ils ont avancés.
4 736 You spoke in your opening comments,
5 Mrs. Grauer, of the importance of these hearings and
6 that is why a number of my colleagues are here today.
7 Among them is Joe Novak, who is the Director of English
8 Television for the region of Alberta; as well, Don
9 Orchard, who is the Director of English radio for
10 Alberta.
11 737 Il y a aussi Lionel Bonneville qui
12 est le directeur de la télévision française de l'ouest
13 qui est avec nous.
14 738 And as well, Slako Kunview(ph), who
15 is the Director of Network Programming for television,
16 who is with us as well.
17 739 We will be addressing many of the
18 concerns at the upcoming licence renewal hearing in
19 May, but we will be getting back as well to a number of
20 the presenters on specific issues that they might have
21 raised that could be addressed directly through them.
22 740 Plusieurs des présentateurs ont parlé
23 du caractère unique et essentiel de la radio et de la
24 télévision de Radio-Canada. Ils ont parlé du rôle de
25 rassembleur. Ils ont parlé aussi de l'importance pour
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1 la préservation de la culture tout comme pour
2 l'apprentissage de la langue.
3 741 Ils ont parlé avec beaucoup de
4 conviction et beaucoup de passion.
5 742 They have told you time and again of
6 the importance of giving CBC the tools that it needs to
7 fully serve the needs of all Canadians.
8 743 In concluding, I would like to thank
9 you again for giving us the opportunity of hearing
10 their comments today.
11 744 Merci beaucoup.
12 745 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
13 746 We will be reconvening again at 6
14 o'clock tonight.
15 747 What I would like to do in particular
16 is to thank the CBC and thank all the presenters we had
17 here today for taking the time to come and share their
18 views at these consultations.
19 748 I would remind everybody that there
20 will be a Public Notice being issued later this month
21 with respect to the licence renewal hearings that are
22 taking place in May in Hull. We will be taking written
23 submissions with respect to that proceeding until the
24 end of April, and I encourage anybody who is interested
25 to please participate again if they would like to do
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1 so.
2 749 Once again, thank you very much, and
3 we will see you at 6 o'clock.
4 --- Recess at 1700/ Suspension à 1700
5 --- Upon resuming at 1800 / Reprise à 1800
6 750 LA PRÉSIDENTE: Bonjour, mesdames et
7 messieurs.
8 751 Welcome to this public consultation
9 on the CBC.
10 752 I guess this will actually be the
11 last of our public consultations on the CBC.
12 753 My name is Cindy Grauer, and I am a
13 CRTC Commissioner.
14 754 We are here to gather your views and
15 comments on CBC radio and television. In your opinion,
16 how should the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation fulfil
17 its role in the coming years?
18 755 Radio-Canada est un service public
19 national qui diffuse en français comme en anglais. Il
20 joue un rôle important dans l'ensemble du système de
21 radiodiffusion canadienne.
22 756 Many elements are constantly being
23 added to the broadcasting system as new technologies
24 multiply, converge, open up new horizons and
25 increasingly offer new services. In this context, we
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1 want to know what are your needs and expectations as
2 viewers and listeners of the CBC.
3 757 Given that, it is very important that
4 the Commission hears what you have to say. We must not
5 lose sight of the fact that the CRTC is a public
6 organization that serves Canadian citizens. In this
7 capacity, we are responsible to you. This is why my
8 fellow Commissioners and myself find it vital to come
9 and meet with you to discuss these issues, and why we
10 are holding these series of regional consultations from
11 one end of the country to the other, in 11 Canadian
12 cities, from March 9th to 18th.
13 758 These consultations are designed to
14 give you a chance, on the eve of a new millennium, to
15 express your opinion on the CBC's role, the programming
16 it offers and the direction it should take at the
17 national, regional and local levels. Through these
18 consultations, we hope to enter into an open dialogue
19 with you and hear your concerns. Your comments will
20 form part of the public record which will be added to
21 the record of the public hearing on the CBC that will
22 begin in Hull next May 25th.
23 759 At this upcoming hearing the
24 Commission will examine the CBC's application for the
25 renewal of its licences, including radio, television
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1 and its specialty services, Newsworld and RDI. You can
2 also take part in that public hearing by sending your
3 written comments to the CRTC. If you wish to do so,
4 please remember to refer to the specific licence
5 renewals being examined when you file your comments.
6 The public notice with respect to that hearing will be
7 issued at the end of this month and you may submit any
8 further comments, or any comments at all, until
9 April 30th.
10 760 Now I would like to come back to
11 today's consultations.
12 761 Please allow me to introduce the CRTC
13 staff who will be assisting us today: Carolyn Pinsky,
14 to my right, our legal counsel; and Michelle Edge, from
15 our Western and Territories Regional Office, who is at
16 the desk outside. Please feel free to call on them
17 with any questions you might have about process today
18 or any other matter.
19 762 So that you will all have the
20 opportunity to speak, we ask that you please limit your
21 presentation to 10 minutes.
22 763 As these consultations are a forum
23 designed especially for you and we want to listen to as
24 many participants as possible, we will not ask any
25 questions unless we need clarification.
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1 764 At the end of this session,
2 representatives from the local CBC stations will have a
3 chance to offer their views, as they are naturally very
4 interested by the issues we are discussing here today.
5 765 Before we start, I would ask our
6 legal counsel to go over some of the housekeeping
7 matters regarding the conduct of this consultation.
8 766 MS PINSKY: Thank you.
9 767 Just a couple of procedural and
10 administrative points.
11 768 First, in terms of how we will
12 proceed this evening, anybody who is here who is
13 registered or wishes to make an oral presentation is
14 invited to take a seat at the table. I will then call
15 each presenter in turn. When I call your name, if you
16 could press the button on the microphone, that way your
17 presentation will be accurately transcribed, and when
18 you are finished shut it off so we don't get feedback.
19 769 We do have translation services
20 available today. If anybody requires a translation
21 device, you can obtain one at the front desk just at
22 the entrance to this room.
23 770 In addition, for those who are here
24 who don't wish to make an oral presentation but would
25 like to leave some written comments, we have comment
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1 sheets available at the front desk and they will be
2 placed on the public file of this proceeding.
3 771 So, with that, we can call the first
4 presenter.
5 772 First, is everybody at the table who
6 intends to make a presentation?
7 773 As well, we have plenty of seats, so
8 if anybody else wants to sit at the table, you are
9 welcome to.
10 774 Our first presenter this evening is
11 Mr. Nicholas Spillios.
12 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
13 775 MR. SPILLIOS: Good evening,
14 Madam Commissioner and CRTC staff. It is a pleasure to
15 be here, to be given an opportunity to express our
16 opinions.
17 776 My name is Nicholas Spillios and I am
18 presenting this brief on behalf of the Society for the
19 Retired and Semi-Retired who is making this brief in
20 support of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
21 777 The CBC is the voice of Canada, and
22 its voice is being muted.
23 778 The CBC is our voice. It is our last
24 link with a national consciousness and protection from
25 the inescapable eroding of Canadian culture by the
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1 United States. This responsibility cannot be left to
2 chance and the commercial interests of private
3 broadcasters.
4 779 The CBC appears to be under attack
5 from within as well as without. These hearings are
6 being held at a turbulent time in the beleaguered
7 corporation's history which upon conclusion of these
8 hearings may not have much remaining to support.
9 780 Granted, it is important to hold
10 these hearings and provide a forum for consumers to
11 voice their opinion on the role of the CBC, but it may
12 have been more appropriate to examine the role and
13 future direction of all broadcasting industries at this
14 time.
15 781 Are private broadcasters exempt from
16 the discussion of their role? The CBC is only one
17 component of the industry. To discuss their role
18 outside of this context becomes a decidedly one-sided
19 discussion.
20 782 According to the 1991 Broadcasting
21 Act, it was stated that:
22 "Programming should be
23 distinctly Canadian, reflect
24 Canada and its regions to
25 national and regional audiences,
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1 contribute to shared national
2 consciousness and identity."
3 (As read)
4 783 The CBC has the opportunity, we feel,
5 to improve the information base of Canadians, to
6 celebrate our common values, as well as respecting the
7 cultural diversity of all Canadians.
8 784 We would like to present an argument,
9 but we would also like to take into account the
10 acceptance of certain givens and observations essential
11 to any discussion of role definition. These include:
12 the changes in demographics, which affect programming;
13 the impact of technological changes, which affect the
14 design and delivery systems; the reliance on public
15 funding for survival; proliferation of Crown
16 Corporations -- we have many Crown Corporations
17 handling almost identical responsibilities; and, that
18 policy makers must exist at arm's length.
19 785 We like to build our rationale by
20 mentioning a few facts.
21 786 Demographics: According to
22 Statistics Canada, in 1992 leisure time was being
23 diminished from 5.5 hours to 4.7. Quebec is the
24 highest viewer in Canada, with Alberta and B.C. the
25 weakest. Young audiences seem to be dwindling and
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1 older audiences seem to be viewing more.
2 787 The American association of retired
3 people stated that by the Year 2000 the older
4 population would be outstripping the younger population
5 and that there would be a drop from -- and there is
6 currently a drop from 2.7 hours to 2.3 hours. Also,
7 73 per cent of seniors are born in Canada. So what of
8 the others? Are we giving them proper attention?
9 788 As far as programming is concerned,
10 cost cuts have impacted upon programming: children's
11 fare, documentaries, independent films, national/
12 international events should be increased.
13 789 The CBC has always stood for
14 excellence, but there seems to be a focus on some of
15 the kinds of things which the CBC does so well: news,
16 events and public affairs programming.
17 790 Now, it is our observation that there
18 is a political impact here. We need neutrality for
19 free expression by artists and others.
20 791 There seems to be a government
21 control of appointments. This seems to be the
22 observation of many of us. And for the first time in
23 many, many years we find that the government in power
24 is not giving support and neither does the opposition.
25 This is one case where there seems to be some agreement
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1 between the two in power.
2 792 In every economics we feel that there
3 should be all -- I'm sorry -- there has been a
4 restructuring of all cultural industries. New
5 technologies are coming in. The cable companies are
6 dedicating up to 500 channels.
7 793 So with this in mind, we would like
8 to offer the following recommendations: a return to
9 original programming while accommodating the make-up of
10 present-day audiences; examining the extent interests
11 are met on private stations.
12 794 This may mean that we have to reduce
13 young adults, the young adult programming, because
14 young adults seem to find a greater preponderance or a
15 greater desire to obtain their entertainment and other
16 activities outside of the home.
17 795 There should be an increase on youth
18 and more programming for older people, ethnocultural
19 programming.
20 796 We should make way for drama, films,
21 independent films. We feel that in Canada many films
22 which do not get proper airing across the country --
23 and case in point is Such A Long Journey, Noah, the
24 Hanging Garden. After they have finished their
25 saturation in places outside of Ontario, this would be
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1 an opportunity to air quality fare of interest to
2 Canadians.
3 797 There should be opportunities for
4 artists to appear on television and radio.
5 798 We feel that there should be in depth
6 research; breakdown of preference by age and taste.
7 799 There is a proliferation, it seems,
8 of Crown Corporations. There are Crown Corporations
9 for the National Film Board, Canadian Radio and
10 Television Telecommunications, Téléfilm Canada. We are
11 asking for perhaps an examination on whether one or two
12 or three of these Crown Corporations could be collapsed
13 or amalgamated.
14 800 Only with additional funding will the
15 inroads of U.S. erosion on our culture be met. The
16 public hearings of cultural industries should be taking
17 place almost immediately.
18 801 We feel, as we examine the support in
19 other countries, such as England with the BBC, that
20 somehow the structure and the way we support
21 financially the CBC should be examined.
22 802 There should be an international
23 exchange through cable and satellite. There are many,
24 many channels being made available. Perhaps the
25 National Film Board and the CBC could work together in
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1 offering a training school for artists, dancers,
2 perhaps writers, producers, directors.
3 803 Finally, I would just like to say --
4 oh, and before that, I would like to say also that I
5 did find one statistic. The top 20 per cent of
6 Canadian income earners account for one third of the
7 spending on entertainment. This seems to be a figure
8 which should be taken into account in the way
9 programming is put together.
10 804 In summary and in conclusion, I would
11 just like to state that we have to be very frank about
12 the preference of Canadians. Canadians want it both
13 ways: they want access to the U.S. programming, but
14 they also want Canadian programming. Let us give it to
15 them. Let us give it to us. Do not take our voice
16 away from us.
17 805 The CRT challenge is to find a
18 balance in the system that should maintain and provide
19 for a national identity and cultural sovereignty as the
20 industry faces increased competition.
21 806 I thank you, Madam Commissioner.
22 807 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
23 Mr. Spillios.
24 808 I did want to point out to you that
25 you suggest a review of all the broadcasting industries
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1 in Canada. In fact, the CRTC is in the midst of just
2 such a review. We have done a major review of private
3 radio; we announced that decision last April. We held
4 extensive hearings this fall on conventional television
5 with a new policy that will be coming out this summer.
6 So, in fact, these are a piece of an overall review of
7 our broadcasting policy, just to reassure that we are
8 certainly not --
9 809 MR. SPILLIOS: Is that information
10 available --
11 810 THE CHAIRPERSON: Absolutely.
12 811 MR. SPILLIOS: -- the results of
13 those hearings?
14 812 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes. It is all in
15 the public record. In fact, we held public
16 consultations here in Alberta last spring, in Banff,
17 Calgary and in Grand Prairie, and it is all on the
18 record.
19 813 MS PINSKY: I would just note, the
20 results of the TV policy hearing aren't on the record
21 yet. They haven't been published, but they will be.
22 814 MR. SPILLIOS: All right. Thank you.
23 I shall wait.
24 815 MS PINSKY: The submissions are, the
25 whole record of the proceeding.
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1 816 MR. SPILLIOS: Is that right.
2 817 Thank you.
3 818 MME PINSKY: La prochaine intervenante
4 est la soeur Ida LaFrance.
5 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
6 819 SOEUR LaFRANCE: Bonsoir tout le
7 monde. Je vous remercie de nous donner l'opportunité
8 de parler au CRTC au sujet des programmes que nous
9 avons en Alberta. J'ai fait ça en -- point form to
10 make it easier.
11 820 Je représente la Fédération des aînés
12 franco-albertains. Nos attentes: que le CRTC soit au
13 service de toutes les provinces à travers tout le
14 Canada. C'est important et vital pour nous en Alberta
15 d'avoir plus d'émissions locales et pour les jeunes
16 d'aujourd'hui -- surtout le peuple francophone à
17 l'ouest du Manitoba. Nous avons besoin d'émissions qui
18 reflètent notre vécu.
19 821 Que le CRTC appuie la création de
20 nouveaux réseaux de l'histoire, des arts et de
21 l'économie de l'ouest semblables aux programmes à RDI
22 afin de faire connaître l'ouest à notre jeunesse
23 canadienne à travers tout le pays.
24 822 Que les personnes âgées aient accès à
25 des feuillets publicitaires écrits et expliqués et mis
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1 à leur disposition dans nos manoirs -- the manors where
2 these seniors are so that it would be like a memo for
3 them -- afin de faciliter l'écoute de la télévision et
4 de la radio en français.
5 823 Nos frustrations: le contenu des
6 programmes de la télévision et de la radio semble
7 ignorer une partie du Canada, la francophonie des
8 provinces de l'ouest -- la Saskatchewan, l'Alberta, la
9 Colombie-Britannique ainsi que les Territoires du
10 Nord-Ouest. Je dis on semble ignorer. C'est qu'on a
11 beaucoup d'émissions qui nous viennent de la province
12 de Québec et c'est très bien, ça nous intéresse, mais
13 des fois c'est trop.
14 824 Avoir des heures d'écoute plus
15 favorables. Pensez aux personnes âgées. Les nouvelles
16 à la télévision, Alberta ce soir, sont à 11 h 30 du
17 soir. Cela n'est pas acceptable.
18 825 Le grève actuelle crée beaucoup de
19 frustration chez tout le monde -- toutes les personnes
20 que j'ai consultées, surtout les personnes âgées -- et
21 peut avoir des conséquences sérieuses du fait que vous
22 perdez plusieurs auditeurs. Comme on comprend les deux
23 langues -- pour moi je suis née en Alberta et je
24 préfère l'anglais. Je fais un effort pour écouter le
25 français parce que je le comprends et ça m'intéresse
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1 mais quand les heures ne sont pas convenables, je
2 retourne à l'anglais.
3 826 Beaucoup d'émissions à des heures
4 convenables pour nous, les aînés, nous proviennent du
5 Québec ou de la France actuellement -- plus que jamais
6 depuis la grève -- et elles ne nous touchent guère.
7 827 Maintenant j'ai des choses positives
8 aussi à vous dire.
9 828 Ce qui nous intéresse surtout et ce
10 que nous apprécions: à la radio les émissions Le Café
11 Show le matin, Mag Ouest l'avant-midi. Le contenu
12 c'est la spiritualité, la santé. Il y a un beau choix
13 de musique et de très belles présentations.
14 L'enrichissement personnel. Parlons en français est
15 une ligne ouverte et l'automne dernier on nous a
16 demandé nos commentaires ici à Edmonton et puis on a
17 exprimé le désir d'avoir une heure de ligne ouverte et
18 puis ils ont écouté notre demande et ils ont mis une
19 heure au lieu d'une demi-heure.
20 829 L'émission Contacts dans
21 l'après-midi -- très intéressant, ça touche nos
22 localités et notre vécu.
23 830 Le poste CHFA nous transmet de
24 l'information sur la cause française en Alberta et de
25 la gestion de nos écoles en Alberta. C'est notre
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1 survivance cela. Aussi on nous tient au courant de la
2 politique albertaine.
3 831 If I want to hear something about the
4 French schools and the school administration. I never
5 have that, very seldom have that on CBC radio. It will
6 be at the French station. And I know exactly what is
7 going on across the province, which is very
8 interesting.
9 832 La télévision: Alberta ce soir à 6
10 heures -- ça nous intéresse et on l'écoute, on apprécie
11 beaucoup cela. Les Nouvelles du sports -- plusieurs
12 écoutent les nouvelles du sport parce qu'elles sont
13 plus expliquées en français qu'en anglais. Le Jour du
14 Seigneur -- très apprécié par plusieurs personnes
15 âgées. Second Regard est très apprécié aussi.
16 Découverte, Le Point, Maisonneuve à l'écoute, la Vraie
17 vie -- ce sont les programmes que les personnes âgées
18 m'ont dit qu'elles écoutaient le plus souvent, surtout
19 ici à Edmonton.
20 833 Maintenant, je vous remercie
21 beaucoup. J'ai une copie pour vous.
22 834 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
23 835 I just wanted to clarify one thing,
24 and this is perhaps a bit the translation. Were you
25 saying there was scheduling information that you are
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1 having trouble getting?
2 836 SISTER LaFRANCE: It's the programs.
3 The hours don't seem to be too convenient for us. You
4 see, we are two hours from Quebec and whatever they get
5 there, well, we get them here but two hours after, you
6 know? Like the news at 11:30, the seniors are all in
7 bed at that time.
8 837 And we used to have a small -- I have
9 called it a clipping of news, Alberta Ce Soir, but
10 since the strike we have nothing. So this is what
11 hurts us the most right now.
12 838 I didn't go into the details of all
13 what Mister so-and-so there talked, but I do approve
14 everything he said about semi-retired and the retired
15 people.
16 839 THE CHAIRPERSON: Well, it is all on
17 the record.
18 840 SISTER LaFRANCE: Okay.
19 841 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
20 much.
21 842 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is
22 Mr. Walter Doskoch.
23 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
24 843 MR. DOSKOCH: That's me.
25 844 CRTC, I want to thank you for
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1 allowing me to speak as a taxpayer, a viewer, a
2 listener and critic. It's a lot of handles.
3 845 I'm one of the megathousands in
4 Canada who support and demand the CBC improve its news
5 and programming to what it was prior to Mulroney's
6 costly free-trade agreements. The CBC is a unifying
7 force in Canada. You can tell that when you travel
8 across Canada, this Canada of ours, and you hear the
9 CBC. You always know you are at home.
10 846 All the private stations sell soaps
11 and you never know where you are at. You swear you are
12 in Yankee land.
13 847 When the CBC was born, the
14 politicians in Canada believed in and fought for a
15 strong and united Canada. Today's crop of politicians,
16 regardless of stripe, seek ways to support corporate
17 elitism and neo-liberalism, the rentier bankers. I
18 kind of get the feeling the politicians today are
19 looking for a spot at the corporate trough, rather than
20 the interests of the Canadian people.
21 848 Where corporations, prior to
22 Mulroney's administration, paid 22 per cent of the
23 taxes and working people paid 30 per cent of the taxes,
24 we had everything. With the coming of free trade,
25 corporations paid 7 per cent and workers paid 40 per
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1 cent tax. Added to this we get GST; we get
2 deregulation; we have got unemployment, we get lay
3 offs; health, education and social services all
4 slashed; and today we pay 60 per cent of the monies
5 earned in one form of tax or another. Today the rich
6 are getting richer and the poor are paying the price.
7 We can no longer afford to feed the rich. The time now
8 is for change.
9 849 The CBC must be renewed. It must
10 create jobs, produce more and better shows, tell
11 Canadian stories. We have a million stories out there
12 that have to be told and the CBC are the only people
13 that can tell them. The CBC can and must create jobs
14 in the cultural field, ensure more and better
15 information is dispensed to the public. The CBC has
16 done a better job of keeping Canadians informed than
17 the press has to date.
18 850 The CBC must continue to operate
19 independent of government and continue to serve the
20 public. We don't need a politician running this thing.
21 851 Further, I oppose privatization of
22 the CBC, and all I have talked to say the same. It was
23 built on a strong foundation. It must remain and
24 continuously be maintained. It is like a person going
25 to the doctor for a check up or getting your teeth
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1 checked by a dentist. That has to be done.
2 852 The CBC was built to serve the public
3 and keep Canada strong and united. It was never built
4 to carry a chief executive officer who is overpaid and
5 all he can see is how much money he can make. Hey,
6 there is 30 million out here; we all have to eat. We
7 don't like unemployment.
8 853 Today I want to say this also. There
9 are about 400 TV outlets. What the hell they are
10 doing, I don't know. But there is only one CBC and
11 that speaks on behalf of Canadians. The rest speak for
12 money.
13 854 Myself, I would sooner pay a tax for
14 viewing TV than watch the mindless advertising on the
15 tube. All the advertising does is disrupt good shows,
16 screws up sports programs and creates a lot of
17 frustration. It is time to stop that stupidity. Why
18 can't TV and radio stations have one hour a day where
19 they can show advertising tastefully? Maybe somebody
20 will learn something instead of cursing a product
21 because it is interfering with a show or a game.
22 855 It's time the CRTC started to work
23 for the people rather than be at the beck and call of
24 the corporations, the way it seems today with all the
25 bloody advertising that is showing on every program.
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1 You can't watch anything for three minutes, there is a
2 lousy -- somebody has to advertise something stupid,
3 and then do it 10 times in a row.
4 856 I think this is sheer insanity and I
5 think this has to be stopped. You are the people that
6 can do it. That's what you hired for, is to look after
7 the needs of the Canadian people, not some corporation
8 from New York or some place else.
9 857 And, as I finish, I would like you to
10 tell Mr. Chrétien to live up to his Red Book promises
11 and settle the CBC strike fairly, because we have had
12 enough of that nonsense, too.
13 858 That is my brief, ma'am.
14 859 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
15 much, Mr. Doskoch.
16 860 MR. DOSKOCH: You are welcome.
17 861 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is
18 Mr. Samuel King.
19 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
20 862 MR. KING: I have just been to the
21 dentist, so I will get the lady sitting next to me to
22 read my stuff for me.
23 863 MS WOODHOPE: Good evening, ladies
24 and gentlemen, and Madam Commissioner.
25 864 Before I go any further, I am a true
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1 born Canadian, but my formative years were in England,
2 hence, my disguise, as it were.
3 865 So Mr. King would like to take the
4 opportunity to air his views about the role and the
5 future of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation,
6 Radio-Canada:
7 "It is well known that all major
8 industrialized nations in the
9 western hemisphere, (incl.
10 Japan), and even in the old
11 communist block have their own
12 public broadcasters, for
13 example, the BBC in the UK.,
14 l'ORTF in France and NHK in
15 Japan. These days, preserving
16 Canadian culture in the face of
17 the American onslaught should be
18 a major concern for all
19 Canadians. I regard the CBC as
20 the last bastion or the last
21 line of defence for this
22 purpose. There was a time when
23 we spoke of Canada from sea to
24 sea to sea. These days, thanks
25 to [the] free trade with our
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1 southern neighbours, the
2 direction is gradually, but
3 notably changing from north to
4 south. So, now I go home each
5 night to spend quality viewing
6 hours watching tasteless
7 dumb-down commercials,
8 interlaced with snippets of
9 useless information, carried to
10 us by our friends in the cable
11 industry. Struggling to break
12 through from all that `junk' is
13 the CBC Newsworld ... and CBC
14 Edmonton [and having a tough
15 time, too.] In my view, the CBC
16 is trying very hard to fulfil
17 its role as the national public
18 broadcaster. But how can they
19 provide this important and
20 necessary service with their
21 hands tied behind their backs,
22 because of insufficient funding.
23 As the song goes, today is
24 yesterday's tomorrow. The
25 future is now. The so-called
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1 new millennium, is just another
2 year in the grand scheme of the
3 universe. But like everything
4 else in life, one should
5 endeavour to progress. The CBC
6 can fulfil its role in a
7 different manner as long as its
8 broadcast policies bring all
9 Canadians together, much more
10 than their financial situation
11 allows them to do at present.
12 Should the CBC provide different
13 programming than those provided
14 by other broadcasters? The
15 answer is a resounding `yes'.
16 (1) We need more unique
17 Canadian programming, not the
18 glossy sleek copies of
19 Americana, which consume large
20 capital expenditure; (2) We
21 need less, not more commercials.
22 Preferably none. Just like BBC
23 ... in the U.K., [BBC (1), that
24 is.]; (3) There should be
25 opportunities for regional local
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1 autonomy. Canada has many
2 regions, with unique identities.
3 Edmonton is hardly Toronto.
4 Quebec City is hardly Vancouver.
5 Only through some
6 de-centralisation can other
7 regions be given the chance to
8 display their talents. The
9 prairies and the maritimes are
10 bursting with various artistic
11 talents. A friend of mine once
12 said that Canada is an `MTV'
13 (Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver)
14 cultural country. If we follow
15 this MTV cultural logic ... and
16 Victoria ..."
17 866 I have missed it.
18 867 MR. KING: Okay. Quebec City.
19 868 MS WOODHOPE:
20 "... [Victoria, Regina and
21 Winnipeg] are not on the map.
22 Here is a powerful argument for
23 de-centralisation. Let's start
24 the new millennia with this
25 concept. In the private
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1 broadcast (commercial) domain,
2 there are some powerful entities
3 who are interesting in [selling]
4 a much smaller --"
5 869 MR. KING: Seeing.
6 MS WOODHOPE:
7 "-- CBC or no CBC at all. Their
8 main interest is snapping up a
9 weakened CBC at bargain prices.
10 We are all witnesses to the
11 exploits of the commercial
12 broadcast industry, with
13 excessive advertising, using all
14 the most aggressive, and mostly
15 tasteless devices to get the
16 viewers attention, all in the
17 interest of making money. I
18 feel sure that most Canadians
19 don't wish to see their CBC that
20 way. The CBC, therefore, should
21 provide the escape from this
22 insanity. We now come to the
23 big question. How do we raise
24 money to keep the CBC Canadian,
25 and possibly commercial-free?
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1 Here are some suggestions: (1)
2 More funding from the
3 government. We know already how
4 tough that is; (2) Maybe all
5 levels of government should
6 collaborate and issue CBC
7 `bonds' which will be available
8 to all Canadians; (3) Canadians
9 should be allowed to `donate'
10 tax-deductible monies [perhaps]
11 to the CBC, similar to [the]
12 `PBS' [in America]; (4) How
13 about each province running
14 their own regional CBC outlets,
15 with daily cross-country
16 linkage?; (5) The CBC should
17 buy Canadian (equipment) as much
18 as possible. Thus supporting
19 Canadian manufacturers, of
20 which, believe it or not, there
21 are many. The CBC has invested
22 vast sums of money in
23 cutting-edge broadcast and audio
24 technology mostly as
25 `consumers'. The foreign
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1 manufacturers of these equipment
2 [for example] (SSL, Neves,
3 Ameks, Sony, Studer, etc), and
4 their Canadian distributors have
5 done very well, but one element
6 is missing. There has been no
7 transfer of `technological
8 know-how'. The BBC in England
9 works with..."
10 870 I have lost my last page.
11 "...[the local] manufacturers at
12 all levels to get the right
13 products for the job, [they]
14 acquire the appropriate
15 technical knowledge [and] avoid
16 obsolescence, and save great
17 sums of money into the bargain.
18 [And that's my suggestion.]
19 Thank you."
20 871 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
21 much, Mr. King and Madam.
22 872 MS PINSKY: Ms Erica Bullwinkle is
23 the next presenter.
24 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
25 873 MS BULLWINKLE: Thank you.
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1 874 I thank you for this opportunity.
2 875 I will just begin by saying a little
3 bit about myself.
4 876 My name is Erica Bullwinkle. I am 42
5 years old, university educated, and currently a
6 full-time mother of three children in grades 2, 5
7 and 8. I came to Canada from Britain in 1982 and
8 became a Canadian citizen about 10 years ago.
9 877 I mention that I am from the U.K.
10 because I believe the strong presence of a public
11 broadcaster in the British media market has meant that
12 British television and radio have maintained a
13 consistently high quality. This is absent in a country
14 like the U.S. where commercial considerations have
15 dominated the development of TV and radio. Our family
16 are strong supporters of public broadcasting. We give
17 financial donations to KSPS in Spokane and used to
18 donate to Access Television here in Alberta.
19 878 I believe that public broadcasting is
20 essential to the functioning of a modern democracy.
21 This is partly because public broadcasters can give
22 more time to news and examination of what is behind the
23 news. But it is also because ownership of the media is
24 becoming increasingly concentrated. This is worrying
25 because of a lack of alternatives in getting
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1 information.
2 879 I would like to give the example of
3 the newspaper market here in Canada.
4 880 Last year we spent 10 months in
5 Britain. Since our return to Edmonton, I have not
6 subscribe to a daily newspaper. The newspaper market
7 fails to offer me the kind of choice that is available
8 in Britain. I am increasingly dependent on the CBC for
9 information and news. It is not only that there are
10 fewer owners in the media, but the types of owners are
11 not very diverse.
12 881 When I lived in Ontario, I worked for
13 a small newspaper and it was owned by the community
14 association which consisted of about 35 clubs and
15 organizations in the town. This type of ownership is
16 not repeated on larger circulation papers nor on
17 private radio or TV stations where owners tend to be
18 drawn from a small section of society.
19 882 Only the CBC has a really diverse
20 ownership -- it belongs to the people of Canada. This
21 does not mean, however, that it belongs to the
22 Government of Canada.
23 883 There are two points that I would
24 like to stress about the future of the CBC.
25 884 The first is that it should be
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1 provided with a guaranteed form of funding. Britain
2 has the TV licence fees. I don't know what kind of
3 things could be considered, a tax on cable fees or
4 something like that, but I think that should be looked
5 into very carefully.
6 885 The second thing is that it should be
7 able to operate at arm's length from government. I was
8 disturbed at the obvious attempts to interfere with the
9 CBC that have arisen as a result of the events
10 surrounding the APEC Summit in Vancouver. I'm sure I'm
11 not alone among viewers in being perplexed as to why
12 Terry Mylewski seems to have disappeared from our
13 screens.
14 886 I want to stress I would have the
15 same concerns whatever party was in power. This is not
16 an attack on the current government.
17 887 For the most part, you can expect
18 politicians to try and influence the way they are seen
19 in the media no matter how good their democratic
20 impulses. Temptation should not be put in their way.
21 888 The CBC needs to be able to maintain
22 that distance. No one in the government should have
23 the power to directly appoint senior people at the CBC.
24 An independent board should do that. With these two
25 guarantees -- proper funding and mechanisms to keep it
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1 arm's length from government -- the CBC should be able
2 to function in a way that promotes the interests of the
3 people of Canada.
4 889 I have said that I believe a public
5 broadcaster is essential to the proper functioning of
6 our democracy in the absence of a diversity of
7 ownership in the media. I believe the CBC currently
8 does a good job in television news production, though
9 it is clearly beginning to lack resources, both locally
10 and in terms of overseas correspondents. I think their
11 numbers should be increased, not decreased.
12 890 My favourite program is actually the
13 National Magazine, which I have missed during the
14 technicians' strike. I think that sometimes the topics
15 it features should be given more time, and I would like
16 to see the CBC being able to put more resources into
17 production of documentaries.
18 891 CBC radio news and As It Happens
19 should also be singled out for praise. I don't believe
20 that CBC Radio One is quite as good as BBC Radio Four
21 in Britain, and I think it would benefit from the
22 introduction of more diverse programming, especially in
23 half-hour format. I would give the examples of The
24 Inside Track and Writers and Company as examples of
25 good programs of this type, but I think there should be
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1 more. Personally, I still miss The Food Programme. I
2 don't understand why it was cancelled.
3 892 I hope that the CBC will strongly
4 resist pressures to accept advertising on radio.
5 893 Of course, the CBC will make
6 increasing use of the Internet and so on in its news
7 coverage. But I think it is important to note that in
8 a world of instant headlines, a broadcaster with a
9 mandate and the proper resources to bring us the story
10 behind the news, the in depth analysis will become
11 increasingly important. Similarly, as the number of
12 channels available increases, the CBC's role as a
13 national communicator will become more vital.
14 894 It is the job of the public
15 broadcaster to feature good Canadian drama and comedy,
16 both made in house and purchased from other Canadian
17 producers. The CBC already does this. I believe that
18 the CBC should maintain a high percentage of
19 Canadian-made programming, though I do not agree that
20 it should have to be exclusively Canadian. I think it
21 is a pity that CBC television carries advertising which
22 detracts from the viewing of anything which has a bit
23 of depth to it. Anyone who is currently following
24 Ken Finkleman's series Foolish Heart must have noticed
25 this.
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1 895 I appreciate the fact that the CBC
2 does not run advertising during its children's
3 programming. If it were not for public broadcasters,
4 there would be virtually no quality children's
5 programming produced in North America. For this alone,
6 the CBC should continue to have our support.
7 896 I came here today, not because I am
8 an expert. I am a very ordinary viewer. But I am one
9 who believes strongly that public broadcasting is very
10 important if we are to maintain thoughtful and quality
11 Canadian programming. I hope government policy will
12 continue to reflect the importance of the CBC to the
13 functioning of our country, to the preservation of its
14 democratic institutions and to the ability of Canadians
15 across the country to talk to each other.
16 897 Thank you.
17 898 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
18 Ms Bullwinkle.
19 899 MS PINSKY: La prochaine intervenant
20 est Mme Patricia Rijavec. Elle n'est pas ici.
21 900 The next presenter is Mr. Jim Borgel.
22 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
23 901 MR. BORGEL: I wish to thank the CRTC
24 for allowing me to comment in regards to public
25 broadcasting in Canada.
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1 902 My name is Jim Borgel, President of
2 Campaign Life Coalition at Alberta.
3 903 As an organization, we seek the
4 protection of all human life from conception to natural
5 death. I know you have received presentations from our
6 organization in other parts of Canada, so I will
7 present the Alberta perspective in our observations.
8 904 An international human rights
9 conference on human rights and values was held in
10 Edmonton on November 26th to the 28th, 1998. On
11 Friday, November 27th we held a demonstration to show
12 the truth and speak on behalf of pre-born children.
13 These were very graphic pictures of aborted babies from
14 eight weeks to full term. Although we notified the
15 CBC, no coverage was provided. Some people indicated
16 the pictures were disturbing. Yes, the pictures
17 displayed are and were absolutely disturbing, but they
18 did speak the truth. They showed what is really
19 happening to some of Canada's children.
20 905 As a side note, the gentleman
21 mentioned here before there are more elderly. Part of
22 the reason is because we don't allow the children to be
23 born.
24 906 Our demonstration was peaceful. Was
25 that the reason no coverage was provided? The silence
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1 for the unborn is deafening.
2 907 In January, the CBC National Magazine
3 "Thou Shall Not Kill" was aired. It is my belief that
4 this documentary produced by the CBC was biased and
5 misleading.
6 908 Recommendation: Before a new licence
7 is granted the CBC, the CRTC request and review the
8 complete interview between Jim Hughes, our national
9 president, and the CBC reporter.
10 909 Also, from this program, review the
11 authenticity of scenes depicting pro-lifers as violent.
12 One clip on program saw angry pro-abortion advocates
13 yelling and screaming at pro-lifers. However, the clip
14 made, it seems that pro-lifers exhibited the obnoxious
15 behaviour.
16 910 Recommendation: The CBC be required
17 to report the truth from an unbiased viewpoint. If
18 they cannot be factual, they forfeit their right to
19 report, cannot be trusted, and therefore their service
20 is compromised and information useless.
21 911 Linda Gibbons -- I don't know if
22 everybody knows who she is; she is a pro-life advocate
23 in Ontario -- has been released from jail, along with
24 others, on the grounds that they were incorrectly
25 charged. Everyone was happy to see here free, but what
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1 about the four years in jail and the treatment she
2 received while in jail? If the CBC wanted to do a
3 story on pro-life radicals in Canada, why didn't they
4 interview the Canadian pro-lifer who has served the
5 most time in jail? Is the reason the CBC did not
6 feature Linda Gibbons because hers is a story of faith,
7 peace and non-violence?
8 912 Recommendation: CBC reports use
9 Canadian content when available and used in an unbiased
10 and balanced manner.
11 913 As a closing point of interest, the
12 best man at our wedding and godfather to one of our
13 children was a chosen child. This person was best man
14 for eight couples and godfather for seven children.
15 How many people of that stature do you know? How many
16 today see the light of day?
17 914 Recommendation: In the new
18 millennium for Canada the CBC should promote love and
19 life instead of sex and death.
20 915 Conclusion: At present, the way I
21 feel now, I would not allow myself to be interviewed by
22 the CBC unless I was guaranteed an unedited copy of
23 tape or video. It is simply a matter of trust.
24 916 I think the CBC has an important role
25 to play in Canada in our diverse country. We are so
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1 broad, I think you absolutely need public broadcasting.
2 We don't want special treatment, just open and honest
3 and unbiased reporting.
4 917 Again, the silence for the unborn is
5 deafening in Canada.
6 918 Thank you for taking the time to hear
7 us.
8 919 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
9 Mr. Borgel.
10 920 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is
11 Mr. Samuel Abernathy.
12 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
13 921 MR. ABERNATHY: I thank you.
14 922 I'm here as a so-called ordinary
15 Canadian. I'm not representing anyone but myself, and
16 I presented to the CRTC, in point form, two copies of
17 my notes which I could read. I would rather not, I
18 suppose.
19 923 THE CHAIRPERSON: It's entirely up to
20 you. You have given it to us. It's part of the public
21 record. But if you are here and you would like to
22 speak, we would certainly be more than happy to hear
23 from you.
24 924 MR. ABERNATHY: Okay. Perhaps what I
25 will speak to is some of the things I have heard, and
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1 have you add, if you will please, into the first point,
2 a subsection --
3 925 THE CHAIRPERSON: What we will do is
4 put all of this on the public record so you can be sure
5 it is there, and you can just add whatever you want to
6 at this point. How is that? Does that suit you?
7 926 MR. ABERNATHY: Sure. I'm not even
8 going to refer to my notes, then.
9 927 THE CHAIRPERSON: Pardon me?
10 928 MR. ABERNATHY: I say, you have my
11 notes. They go onto the public record. I will just
12 speak.
13 929 The BCB to me is very important as a
14 unifying entity in Canada, as a corporate entity, or
15 however it is structured.
16 --- Off microphone / Sans microphone
17 930 MR. ABERNATHY: How is that?
18 931 As I was saying, the CBC seems to me
19 to serve as a unifying force within Canada. It's not
20 bridging the gulf between French-speaking and
21 English-speaking members of our country. I can't
22 listen to French radio or watch French television
23 without a translation, nor could I listen to the
24 women's statement, which I would have loved to have
25 heard, without the translation -- I noticed I think the
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1 Commissioner was unable to do likewise -- which to me
2 I'm ashamed to say it's a fact. I just can't do it.
3 But I would like to have access to French programming.
4 932 I believe, as your first speaker
5 said, it's very important that the CBC remain at arm's
6 length from the government.
7 933 With respect to -- she is gone now --
8 the woman who spoke of the British broadcasting system,
9 it's got its funding and it is functioning at arm's
10 length. It has a very good variety of programming and
11 it is not interfered with through advertising and the
12 American model of broadcasting, which seems to be it is
13 entirely profit driven.
14 934 The CBC has never been a
15 profit-driven broadcaster. It has been a public
16 broadcaster for all Canadians to speak to Canadians in
17 all our geographically vast regions, some have
18 mentioned from sea to sea to sea. That sort of covers
19 most of Canada. But we have a huge country and the CBC
20 is vitally important to those people within the
21 country.
22 935 And the woman who spoke with
23 reference to the United Kingdom's system of media sort
24 of alluded to the fact that the CBC is a broadcaster
25 which is world famous. She mentioned As It Happens.
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1 There are people who will ring into As It Happens,
2 which is a radio program, from America saying, you
3 know, "We love this program. Why can't we have
4 something like that in America?"
5 936 We have it in Canada and I don't know
6 what can be done to preserve it, except renew the CBC's
7 licence and somehow have the CBC guaranteed its funding
8 to provide us with topics and issues that are important
9 to all Canadians in all the different areas of Canada
10 and promote the Canadian culture and Canadian unity.
11 937 I have, at the end, the
12 recommendation for replacing the current President,
13 Mr. Peron Beatie. I put forward the names of a
14 Mr. Ian Brown, who CBC radio listeners will know as a
15 very good broadcaster in Toronto; and an executive
16 director at Sheridan College, Mr. Ronald Holgerson.
17 938 That's all I wish to say.
18 939 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
19 much, Mr. Abernathy.
20 940 MR. ABERNATHY: You're welcome.
21 941 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is
22 Mr. Bill Lock.
23 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
24 942 MR. LOCK: Thank you for giving us
25 all the opportunity to speak here and have this forum.
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1 943 I am 43 years old. I'm a year older
2 than Erica. I have three children and I live in
3 Calgary. That's where I raise my family; that's where
4 I was born; that's where my parents live.
5 944 I'm what is considered an emerging
6 television producer. I have been working in the
7 production industry for over 20 years and have been
8 producing television programs in Bennett(ph) Lake for
9 the past few years.
10 945 I have come to speak about the issues
11 from the context of an Albertan and as a Calgarian,
12 that is, of a community member, and one who is quite
13 involved in the community. I was executive director of
14 a social agency for 10 years. I speak as a community
15 member because I'm very happy to live here, to work
16 here and to raise my children here.
17 946 I'm speaking here about CBC
18 television specifically. I see the CBC as a meeting
19 place for those of us who share a common interest and a
20 common place, where we get to know our neighbours.
21 It's a way that we speak and it is a way that we are
22 heard, where we find out more about each other, about
23 people, events and issues, where we live. An in depth
24 kind of two-way communication.
25 947 As such, the CBC is a very powerful
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1 means by which we transmit and collect and create
2 stories from one way to another. I think the CBC, on a
3 national level, does that very well, telling stories
4 from one place for Canadians around the country, and
5 that those stories are told excellently with the
6 support of expertise and money and decision-making
7 power.
8 948 But at the same time, we need these
9 same kinds of efforts in the regions, and specifically
10 in Alberta, where we live, where we work, where we have
11 our friends and family, where we have community. To do
12 these things we need the money and the expertise and
13 the local decision-making power for these things to
14 happen. So I believe that there are certain
15 prerequisites for these things to happen:
16 949 Number one, infrastructure on a local
17 level for the CBC, not skeleton staff.
18 950 Number two, decision-making power
19 within the region where there are locally designated
20 funds; and, in particular, here in Alberta, an envelope
21 of money. With that decision-making power there needs
22 to be hands-off decision making within the region so
23 that programs can be decided upon here and in Alberta
24 without that control being taken away from head office.
25 951 Number three, joint efforts and
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1 independent efforts by local producers, writers,
2 creative people and technical people. We need ice
3 time; we need programming time within the programming
4 schedule. As there is very little or no time in the
5 local programming schedule, we need to have that room
6 made where we can have programs shown that are made
7 here and showcased.
8 952 Number five, research and development
9 to support script writing, new ideas and new
10 programming.
11 953 Number six, the development of
12 people, that is, professional development of
13 professionals within the industry, to assist them in
14 the business and the craft of story telling.
15 954 This afternoon the Alberta Motion
16 Picture Industry spoke about having envelopes of money
17 and programming time: specifically, $2 million a year
18 for indigenous programming, I support that very much;
19 as well as the idea of setting aside programming time.
20 Both are essential. But I think there are other
21 prerequisites that are necessary: an envelope of money
22 for development, an envelope of money for professional
23 development.
24 955 To support the local community
25 involvement of programming, I would suggest that there
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1 be some kind of arm's-length steering committee from
2 the community consisting of professionals and community
3 members with other backgrounds.
4 956 I see some of this beginning to
5 happen since the appointment of a new regional director
6 in Alberta, and I applaud this; money going towards the
7 development of new programming, support for the
8 industry, which includes professional development and
9 the AMPI awards in Alberta.
10 957 As well, the new regional director,
11 and the CBC in particular, has given support to other
12 cultural organizations such as the NSI with support for
13 local heroes, and the National Film Board, all of which
14 are very important.
15 958 Thank you very much.
16 959 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
17 Mr. Lock.
18 960 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is
19 Mr. Randy Boissonnault.
20 961 Okay. The presenter following that
21 will be Mr. Jason Lucien.
22 962 I understand that Mr. Web Dussome has
23 arrived.
24 --- Off microphone / Sans microphone
25 963 MS PINSKY: I'm sorry; you are at the
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1 table. Wonderful. You can begin when it is convenient
2 for you.
3 --- Off microphone / Sans microphone
4 964 MS PINSKY: Ms Katherine Weinmann.
5 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
6 965 MS WEINMANN: Good evening.
7 966 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good evening.
8 967 MS WEINMANN: I have just arrived and
9 I heard just a snippet of your presentation and the
10 gentleman that just preceded me.
11 968 I come as a citizen of Canada who
12 is -- I don't usually do things like this, but I'm
13 fiercely proud of the quality and the integrity of the
14 CBC. I am also deeply angered when I see the cuts that
15 have gone on, quite systematically, to something that,
16 as this gentleman spoke to, people around the world
17 value and that people around the world wish to emulate.
18 969 The Americans that call up and rely
19 on the CBC, particularly the radio, to know that they
20 are going to get objective, real, high-quality
21 journalism, that they are going to find out what is
22 going on in the world, they choose that over what it is
23 that they have as their choices, which would be CNN,
24 whatever it is that Ted Turner or Rupert Murdoch or
25 Conrad Black, or whatever, whatever else is out there
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1 as the alternative.
2 970 It frustrates me when I see that the
3 things that for me make Canada wonderful, that at times
4 it's like we -- and I'm going to say that as a "we" --
5 we sell ourselves short and we sell ourselves down the
6 river on those things.
7 971 The CBC for me is something that
8 really connects me to this country, to a country that
9 is very large and vast.
10 972 I remember 20 years ago a friend of
11 mine who said that when he travels across Canada and
12 when he is feeling homesick and disconnected from his
13 family and friends, he knows when he turns on either
14 the CBC radio, AM or FM, or would turn on the
15 television, that he knew that someone in his life would
16 be watching that at the same time, and that that was
17 something that always helped him feel connected, as it
18 does for me, and I think many people -- people who are
19 here using their voice to say how important this is.
20 973 When I look at -- and what has
21 occurred to me just recently when I take a look at what
22 is occurring with the CBC in terms of the moves towards
23 more privatization, what has occurred to me is that --
24 and perhaps a question that I'm coming to and maybe
25 others have is that this to me appears to be
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1 simultaneous with this country's moving into the NAFTA
2 agreement, that, to me, I'm struck by -- and I might
3 have thought there was a coincidence, but I'm beginning
4 to think that perhaps it isn't a coincidence.
5 974 So when we are looking at solutions
6 and when we are looking at making proposals inasmuch as
7 what is it that we can do to safeguard and to assure
8 that something that so many of us value, for me the
9 solution is that maybe as a country what we really need
10 to look at doing is getting ourselves out of NAFTA.
11 Maybe what we really need to look at is what the cost
12 has been since we have moved into NAFTA in terms of
13 privatization, in terms of moving towards -- having
14 greater impact, and that the voice of corporations seem
15 to be heard more than the voice of people, people who
16 really matter.
17 975 What I have just learned is that it
18 is a very simple process. All we need to do is, as a
19 country, have our government give written notice to the
20 other two parties of the NAFTA agreement and after six
21 months we are free and clear of it. I didn't realize
22 it was that simple but that is as simple as it is, in
23 that it really does require all of us to say that
24 that's what is important to us, to safeguard what it is
25 that we need to have and what it is that other people
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1 around the world value.
2 976 That's really what I needed to say
3 and I thank you for your time.
4 977 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
5 much, Ms Weinmann, for coming here tonight.
6 978 MS WEINMANN: Okay. Thank you.
7 979 MS PINSKY: Mr. Webb Dussome.
8 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
9 980 MR. DUSSOME: Thank you very much.
10 981 Like the previous speaker, I must
11 admit that I haven't done anything like this.
12 982 I suppose what drives me somewhat to
13 do this type of thing these days is I, besides on a
14 personal level but also as a parent of two very small
15 children -- my children are four years old and one year
16 old -- one of the things that I had to decide as a
17 parent when I had these children were some of the
18 things that I felt were very important to me as an
19 individual that I wished that I could pass on to my
20 children and try to ensure that their future had some
21 of the richness and enjoyment -- and I don't mean it in
22 a monetary sense, I mean it as a cultural and national
23 experience -- that they would have the opportunity to
24 experience.
25 983 So when I went through that
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1 self-searching, one of the institutions, if you will,
2 that have been I guess a part of in my life has been
3 the CBC. Primarily radio. I suppose I'm in the
4 minority to tell you that I don't have cable television
5 and I'm not particularly interested in having it.
6 984 But I guess overall I wanted to make
7 just a couple of short but very I hope clear points.
8 985 The first is that, at the present
9 time, I'm really not concerned per se with the role
10 that the CBC plays in our country. As the previous
11 speaker said, one of the things that is extremely
12 important to me as a Canadian is to have a Canadian
13 tell me what is going on in my country and also around
14 the world. What that means to me is that I see my
15 country as being somewhat different culturally,
16 et cetera, from other English-speaking countries in the
17 world, and it's -- I guess it provides for me perhaps
18 some credibility in listening to, again, the stories
19 told by Canadians from a Canadian perspective.
20 986 I suppose that I am a little bit
21 disappointed by the impact I think of some of the
22 budget cuts to the CBC. Some of them I think which
23 would disappoint me the most would be to diminish the
24 service to the point where it becomes -- and I come at
25 it I guess perhaps at a financial level as well --
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1 diminish it to the point where it no longer becomes
2 financially feasible. That people would look at it and
3 say "This isn't financially a viable enterprise."
4 987 I don't think that the whole thing
5 works on dollars and cents because, for me it certainly
6 doesn't. One of the points that I would certainly like
7 to make crystal clear is that if Mr. Chrétien and the
8 federal government want to spend my tax money on the
9 CBC, that's fine with me. I suppose that's one of the
10 things that I would really want to make clear today,
11 that in my mind, spending my tax money on the CBC is a
12 tremendous investment and I would certainly, as a
13 Canadian citizen, wholeheartedly support that.
14 988 The CBC strength I have always seen
15 is its ability to provide quality as far as national
16 programming.
17 989 One of the concerns I have with the
18 cuts of course is some of the impacts that I have seen
19 on the regional levels. With the mix I think of
20 programming, particularly national, that's been
21 effective and interesting to me over the years, the CBC
22 has played a different role. It has played a role that
23 I don't believe anybody else can play at least at this
24 point in time successfully.
25 990 As a previous speaker talked about,
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1 NAFTA, one of the things that I think is very key to
2 the future of information, of culture, et cetera, in
3 our country. We recently, in the last few weeks have
4 been watching the issue related to Bill C-55, et
5 cetera. Part of what I see from that, I believe that
6 there are some positive parts and positive aspects to
7 globalization.
8 991 One of the negative aspects,
9 certainly, is that other countries, at a certain level,
10 will begin to have some say as to things like split-run
11 magazines, et cetera, and that certainly concerns me
12 individually.
13 992 But I guess, getting back to my
14 initial point, I have been a CBC particularly radio
15 listener for about the last 20 years. One of the
16 things which I agreed with the previous speaker is that
17 it has helped bring this country into my home and into
18 me as an individual.
19 993 My wife and I, a couple of years ago,
20 drove from Edmonton to Quebec City and back. One of
21 the things that I have really found interesting about
22 that trip, after my years of listening to CBC radio, is
23 that I visited a lot of places I had never been except
24 I felt I had been there before. That was kind of
25 important to me, and I wouldn't have had that type of
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1 experience.
2 994 So I guess to sum up, I don't have
3 what you -- I don't think that I have a concern
4 presently with the role of the CBC. I hope that
5 funding cuts don't reduce it to sort of a national sort
6 of specialty off-the-wall kind of entity that will
7 become financially unviable to the point of not being
8 in existence any more.
9 995 The CBC is important to me. It's
10 important to my children's future. The reason why it's
11 important to my children's future again is that I
12 really believe that it has provided me with an
13 opportunity to experience my country, stories told by
14 Canadians.
15 996 The other thing that I think is
16 important, especially to the future of the CBC, is that
17 technology will continue to play a bigger and bigger
18 role in not just broadcast but all kinds of media.
19 Again, that perhaps is a bit of a funding issue, but it
20 is important, I believe, for the CBC to be sufficiently
21 funded to be part of that -- by "part of that", I mean
22 with respect to the Internet, globalization, satellite,
23 et cetera.
24 997 So my hope for the future would be a
25 CBC that continues to provide much of what it provides
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1 today. When my children are watching CBC television
2 during the weekdays in the mornings, there is about an
3 hour or so in there where there isn't any commercials,
4 and I appreciate that.
5 998 So there are lots of things that I
6 think are possible, so I would come tonight not trying
7 to pick it apart as much as to provide my wholehearted
8 support.
9 999 Again, if the federal government
10 wants to spend my tax money on the CBC, they have my
11 blessing, and I wish the continued role of the CBC in
12 my life and hopefully the lives of my children will
13 hopefully be assured.
14 1000 Thanks very much for listening.
15 1001 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much
16 for coming here tonight, Mr. Dussome.
17 1002 MME PINSKY: La prochaine
18 intervenante c'est Mme Patricia Rijavec.
19 PRÉSENTATION / PRESENTATION
20 1003 MME RIJAVEC: CHFA, notre radio
21 française en Alberta est le principal lien entre nous,
22 entre nos organismes, entre les différentes communautés
23 françaises.
24 1004 Notre seule émission
25 franco-albertaine télévisée, Le ce soir, malgré sa
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1 qualité et son importance, n'est qu'une demi-heure
2 quotidiennement et notre journal français, Le franco,
3 est un hebdomadaire.
4 1005 Grâce à CHFA, nous pouvons donner et
5 recevoir des nouvelles en français sur ce qui se vit en
6 français aux quatre coins de notre province.
7 1006 En tant qu'organisme regroupant les
8 comités de parents du préscolaire et du scolaire en
9 Alberta, nous sommes heureux de la contribution de
10 notre station de radio dans la promotion de nos
11 services et activités.
12 1007 La couverture d'événements importants
13 dans le domaine de l'éducation français langue première
14 en Alberta, que ce soit par des entrevues, des
15 reportages ou des nouvelles est vitale pour le présent
16 et l'avenir de nos communautés francophones.
17 1008 Au cours des années, nous avons pu
18 suivre à la radio, au fur et à mesure qu'ils se
19 produisaient, les pourparlers, les efforts et les
20 réussites des parents qui, en étroite collaboration
21 avec les conseil scolaires et de coordination, ont mis
22 sur pied 18 écoles françaises langue première.
23 1009 Nous avons été tenus au courant des
24 péripéties de l'obtention de la gestion scolaire en
25 1994 et grâce à la vigilance de notre station de radio
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1 nous continuons d'être informés des récents
2 développements cruciaux dans ce dossier.
3 1010 Au-delà des dossiers politiques qui
4 nous concernent directement, nous avons la chance, avec
5 Radio-Canada, non seulement de savoir ce qui se passe
6 chez nous en Alberta mais aussi de faire connaître
7 notre réalité albertaine au reste du Canada que ce soit
8 au Café Show le matin, à Parlons-en le midi, à Mag
9 Ouest en après-midi, à Contacts en fin de journée ou la
10 fin de semaine à Samedi et Dimanche, CHFA est à
11 l'écoute. Sa dynamique programmation nous garde
12 toujours branchés sur ce qui se passe en français, que
13 ce soit en éducation, en développement communautaire
14 ou au niveau des activités culturelles.
15 1011 De plus, Radio-Canada est un
16 partenaire important dans le développement et la
17 promotion de nos jeunes talents régionaux et a toujours
18 donné une place importante à notre culture. CHFA est
19 un partenaire privilégié de la Fédération des parents
20 francophones de l'Alberta dans ses initiatives de
21 développement. Pour la FPFA, la promotion de la langue
22 et de la culture françaises est d'une importance vitale
23 en milieu anglais dominant.
24 1012 Grâce à une programmation française
25 de qualité, CHFA, la station régionale de la radio de
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1 Radio-Canada stimule la fierté d'être francophone et
2 aide ainsi à contrer l'assimilation.
3 1013 Pour grandir il faut se nourrir.
4 CHFA nourrit la francophonie.
5 1014 Et sur une note un peu plus
6 personnelle, j'aimerais ajouter que pour notre famille
7 CHFA est vraiment un membre de la famille. Pour mon
8 beau-père -- c'est un des pionniers de la radio quand
9 il est venu de Sudbury, et grâce à son implication dans
10 la radio dans les premières années, ses enfants ont pu
11 cultiver leur goût de la musique classique et leur
12 fierté de la langue et la culture françaises.
13 1015 Pour moi, j'ai toujours grandi avec
14 la radio. Mon grand-père étant immigrant de la France,
15 et les bistros du coin inexistants, la radio était son
16 fidèle compagnon jusqu'à la mort. Comme il était un
17 peu sourd vers la fin de ses années, c'était le fidèle
18 compagnon de toute la famille et je suis très heureuse
19 maintenant de pouvoir mettre le poste à CHFA et
20 partager toute la culture et la vitalité de la langue
21 avec mes enfants.
22 1016 Je vous remercie et en espérant
23 garder CHFA avec nous longtemps.
24 1017 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
25 much, Madame Rijavec.
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1 1018 MRS. RIJAVEC: Thank you.
2 1019 MS PINSKY: I'll call again
3 Mr. Randy Boissonnault. Is he in the room now?
4 1020 Or Mr. Jason Lucien?
5 1021 I will just see if any of the other
6 following people who had registered are here and for
7 some reason haven't registered at our front desk:
8 Ms Laurie Greenwood; Ms Michelle Wilson;
9 Ms Jenny Frost.
10 1022 MS PINSKY: Okay. You can make your
11 presentation now. You can begin.
12 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
13 1023 MS FROST: Good evening.
14 1024 I have come to talk to you tonight
15 because I wish to express my strong support and
16 appreciation for the CBC, especially the CBC radio.
17 1025 I work mostly as a stay-at-home
18 mother of three children aged 15, 14 and 11, and in the
19 spaces I can find around that work I write poetry and I
20 perform as a professional storyteller. So I shall
21 speak to you about CBC, what it has done and continues
22 to do for me in my family life, and also as a member of
23 Edmonton's literary community.
24 1026 The radio in our house is permanently
25 tuned to the CBC. When I was single and had more time
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1 I listened to the six o'clock news and As It Happens
2 virtually every night, and to the FM stations'
3 wonderful classical music as much as I could. Now I
4 don't have that kind of time, but I have the AM station
5 on mostly for the news and weather and local morning or
6 afternoon programs as I'm making meals.
7 1027 I rely on the radio for news
8 reporting. I listen to CBC because its news reporting
9 is objective and thorough and gives me news from all
10 parts of Canada. I especially like its periodic
11 in depth coverage of particular issues. CBC does good
12 documentaries.
13 1028 Though I don't listen to radio as
14 much as I used to, my oldest son listens a great deal.
15 Michael is 15 years old and has been a devoted CBC fan
16 for as long as he or I can remember.
17 1029 Michael was one of those children who
18 always woke up at six o'clock bright eyed and raring to
19 go and I remember the incredible relief my husband I
20 experienced when we found that if we left a peanut
21 butter sandwich by the radio for him, he would happily
22 eat his sandwich and listen to the radio at six o'clock
23 instead of jumping on us in bed. When we got up at
24 7:00 or 7:30 he would still be listening and would tell
25 us all about what was going on in the city that
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1 morning. Now, he started doing this when he was three
2 or four.
3 1030 I don't remember when Michael
4 discovered the Quirks and Quarks program; at least
5 10 years ago. That necessitated his being brought home
6 from ever we were on Saturday noon in time for him to
7 hear it. Michael has always loved the Good Questions
8 feature of the Morning Program, has sent questions into
9 it, and once one a coffee mug for stumping the experts.
10 He still wakes up early in the morning and listens to
11 CBC beginning at 5:30 and figures he regularly listens
12 to two hours programming a day, and some days more.
13 1031 CBC radio is really important for
14 Michael because he has a severe learning disability,
15 which means he learns far more easily from material he
16 hears than material he reads. All the informational
17 programming he has heard on CBC, the news, the
18 political commentary, the science programs, the
19 interviews with people on every possible subject, have
20 been vital in teaching him about the world he lives in.
21 In fact, I think he is unusually well informed for a
22 15-year old and I thank the CBC with deep gratitude for
23 that.
24 1032 You will notice I haven't said a word
25 about television. That is because I won't have a
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1 television in the house. This is partly to protect my
2 children from constantly seeing violence, but mostly
3 it's because I don't want them exposed to constant
4 manipulation by commercial advertising.
5 1033 When my daughter was two years old,
6 she came home from my mother's house one day and told
7 me excitedly, "I saw television." "Good", I said,
8 "What did you see?" "A hair dryer." Goodness knows
9 what program she watched. What she remembered was the
10 hair advertisement.
11 1034 I tell you this to show you how
12 important it is to me that CBC does not have commercial
13 advertising. I was horrified to hear there was some
14 possibility that CBC might try to fund some of the
15 programs endangered by budget cuts by finding companies
16 to sponsor them.
17 1035 I do not want commercial advertising
18 of any sort on CBC ever. Our world is saturated with
19 advertising. CBC is one of the few parts of our
20 everyday life that is not tainted by some company's
21 push to make us buy some product. We all need the
22 contrast of these clear spaces, such as CBC offers, so
23 that we keep on noticing when people are trying to sell
24 us stuff.
25 1036 The advertising the CBC does do for
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1 local concerts or happenings around time is a valuable
2 community service. I commend the CBC for supporting
3 the community cultural life as they do through their
4 announcements and/or sponsorship of local events.
5 Local groups don't have the money to pay advertising
6 costs. Newspaper ads and commercial radio spots are
7 very expensive, but the events that those groups stage
8 enrich community life and CBC's support of them makes a
9 big difference to their success.
10 1037 For the past two years, I and several
11 other Edmonton storytellers have staged a November
12 storytelling concert called Telebration.
13 Telebration '97 had a disappointingly small audience
14 despite our attempts to publicize it well.
15 Telebration '98 had CBC sponsorship free to us and what
16 a difference. Our audience was five times as big as
17 last year's. So we thank the CBC for our very
18 successful evening.
19 1038 When I asked Michael what was the
20 most important reason why we need CBC, he said, because
21 it gives Canadians a chance to hear other Canadians'
22 views. I agree absolutely.
23 1039 CBC is a vital force in informing all
24 of us about our country and making us proud to be
25 Canadian. It is the single, most important force
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1 working for Canadian unity that I can name. I listen
2 to CBC because I hear really interesting things about
3 other Canadians. I hear about places I know nothing
4 about and places I know intimately. Both interest me.
5 I think both national and regional programs are equally
6 important.
7 1040 My sister moved to the maritimes for
8 a year and told me how grateful she was for the
9 Atlantic regional programming. She said it taught her
10 about the area she was living in and pointed her in
11 directions she wouldn't have explored on her own
12 because she wouldn't otherwise have known that they
13 were there to explore.
14 1041 I appreciate that CBC records musical
15 groups across the country so I can hear notable
16 performances from all over Canada. I feel proud when I
17 see CBC recording our Edmonton orchestra, chamber music
18 or singers and know that this music will be heard
19 country-wide. The various contests the CBC runs
20 solicit a great deal of creative input from the
21 community, and that's rewarding for both the
22 contributors and the listeners.
23 1042 It matters to me that Canadians hear
24 the wonderful music, drama, poetry and stories that
25 other Canadians create. I want my children to grow up
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1 knowing the talent and diversity Canada has to offer
2 them and to realize there is more to the world than the
3 slick, cute version offered by Disney.
4 1043 The CBC is the single, most important
5 sponsor and publicizer of Canadian musical and literary
6 endeavours. We all need the CBC.
7 1044 Finally, I want to say how important
8 it is that the licensing terms of the CBC spell out
9 clearly that CBC should be as independent as it can be
10 of whatever government is in power. I realize
11 government money funds the CBC. But of course the
12 government does not own that money. That money belongs
13 to me and other taxpayers, and the government is simply
14 entrusted to manage it for us the way we want it
15 managed. I want my money provided generously to the
16 CBC.
17 1045 The CBC must not dwindle into a mere
18 spokesperson for whatever government is currently in
19 Ottawa. Therefore, its president and board of
20 directors should not be chosen by political
21 appointment, but rather by an independent panel who
22 will choose people for their expertise in broadcasting
23 and management. There is no hope that any government
24 will stay honest if it doesn't have to face informed
25 and free-voiced criticism. CBC must have the funding
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1 to stay informed and the autonomy to be able to be that
2 critical voice and we will all benefit.
3 1046 So in summary, then, I support the
4 CBC because I think it is the single biggest force in
5 the country promoting Canadian unity and Canadian
6 culture, and because I think it does a tremendous job
7 of informing us about Canada. I listen to it for its
8 excellent news service, wonderful classical music, and
9 to hear the voices of Canadians from all over this
10 country. I'm very grateful to the CBC for how much it
11 has educated my son.
12 1047 It is very important to me that CBC
13 does not carry commercial advertising of any sort and I
14 urge that its president and board of directors be
15 appointed by an independent panel so CBC can be as
16 autonomous as possible from whatever government is
17 currently in power.
18 1048 In closing, I would like to thank the
19 CRTC for holding these cross-country hearings and
20 giving me, an ordinary Canadian, this chance to have my
21 views heard.
22 1049 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
23 Ms Frost.
24 1050 MS PINSKY: Mr. Ned Toole is the next
25 presenter.
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1 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
2 1051 MR. TOOLE: (Off microphone/sans
3 microphone)
4 1052 MS PINSKY: If you can please turn on
5 the microphone.
6 1053 MR. TOOLE: Oh, is it not on? I
7 think I just need to be a little closer.
8 1054 Fellow members of the audience who
9 are CBC supporters, I wish you good evening.
10 1055 I so wish I could say something
11 inspiring or arresting or original to enhance and
12 further the cause of the Canadian Broadcasting
13 Corporation, but I know all the appropriate things
14 concerning the CBC have been said before, and whatever
15 I can add will at best be a repetition. Nevertheless,
16 let all those good things about the CBC be said again
17 and again and proclaimed loudly and clearly.
18 1056 At the outset, I find it strange that
19 the CRTC, the so-called defender of Canada's airwaves
20 and broadcast communications, should be asking the
21 corporation to defend its position by seeking renewal
22 of its licences, should that not be automatic.
23 1057 Let us trust that such an exercise is
24 a diversionary tactic to give Canadians an opportunity
25 to speak out in defence of this unique broadcaster and
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1 the fabulous asset that we now have.
2 1058 When I recall the hours of worthwhile
3 and edifying entertainment, the knowledgeable
4 discourse, the inspiring recital of music, even the
5 good sports reporting that has been provided by the CBC
6 and to me over 50 years, I must consider it my good
7 fortune in having such a wonderful fare available.
8 1059 On the other side of that coin, the
9 prospect of losing and not having such wonderful radio
10 and TV programming for my old age is exceedingly
11 daunting. Where else on the radio and TV dials can one
12 find programming that engages one's mind beyond the
13 juvenile levels? I ask those of you who travel south
14 of our border to the great bastion of free enterprise
15 and private broadcasting to compare the quality of
16 entertainment and news and political commentary on the
17 U.S. radio or TV.
18 1060 My associates and travelling
19 companions are quite unanimous in judging that news and
20 commentary is brief, shallow and intensely locally
21 centred in the U.S.A. May I suggest that those
22 characteristics are the legacy of private ownership
23 with a political bias and an extreme sensitivity for
24 the feelings of advertisers.
25 1061 The reality of the so-called
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1 censorship chill exercised by powerful, commercial,
2 financial, industrial and political forces is ever
3 present in this era of corporate mergers and
4 amalgamation and so-called globalization. The
5 existence of a broadcast medium that can function at
6 arm's length from or with freedom from such forces is
7 an essential element in our society.
8 1062 Note the existence of Canadian
9 Air Farce, This Hour Has 22 Minutes, and other similar
10 programs that can laugh and poke fun at our various
11 institutions. They exist only on CBC and only in
12 Canada.
13 1063 Even the existence of the CBC in both
14 radio and TV media provides a leadership example and
15 peer pressure on its private enterprise broadcasting
16 counterparts in this country to be more adventuresome
17 and creative than the broadcasters in the U.S.A., which
18 have no similar national comparative examples.
19 1064 The final point that I, as a
20 listener, wish to make in favour of the CBC,
21 particularly its radio wing, is the practice of dealing
22 with current matters of interest or concern in a
23 reasonable depth and with an allotment of time that
24 allows comprehensive treatment on subjects in order to
25 develop more than a 20-second clip of single dimension
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1 coverage.
2 1065 Where else can one find programs like
3 Quirks and Quarks, Ideas Presents, even Market Place
4 and David Suzuki? What wonderful programs. May they
5 go on forever and ever.
6 1066 I thank all concerned for this
7 opportunity to support and advance the CBC as an
8 independent broadcaster for the benefit of Canadians.
9 1067 Thank you, ma'am.
10 1068 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you,
11 Mr. Toole.
12 1069 MS PINSKY: The next presenter is
13 Ms Michelle Wilson.
14 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
15 1070 MR. WILSON: Actually, I'm going to
16 speak. I'm Mr. Wilson here. We have the same things
17 to say.
18 1071 THE CHAIRPERSON: Mr. & Mrs. Wilson.
19 1072 MR. WILSON: Yes.
20 1073 I think in some ways we feel we have
21 come to take your time unnecessarily, because I think
22 we have many of the same things to say that lots of
23 people have said before us, and indeed even the two
24 speakers who we have just heard speak have said before
25 us. But I suppose we think there is something to be
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1 said for adding to the numbers and putting forth our
2 general support for these ideas.
3 1074 I guess we are here primarily to
4 defend the CBC radio. We like the CBC TV, but we see
5 it as less important in our lives than the radio. We
6 place tremendous value on the radio. We listen to it a
7 great deal of the time and we are always amazed that we
8 get such great entertainment for so very little out of
9 having it there all the time, kind of thing.
10 1075 I think what I would like to turn to
11 now is to just say a few things about the things we
12 most like about the CBC, and I suppose a few things
13 that we perhaps think are slipping.
14 1076 We very much like the idea of having
15 a national network. I think that is terribly important
16 to us. I'm sure lots of people have said it is
17 terribly important in terms of contributing to national
18 unity, which I agree with. I think if we all have the
19 same experiences in Canada, this certainly makes us
20 collectively more Canadian. But I think it is also
21 important just in the sense that we really like to know
22 what is going on elsewhere in Canada.
23 1077 I think, you know, no other radio
24 station in town, for example, let's us know what is
25 going on in the National Gallery or let's us know what
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1 shows are on in Toronto and Halifax and that sort of
2 thing. We certainly find that to be extremely
3 valuable.
4 1078 Second, we very much like the idea
5 that there are no commercials. We like it for the
6 obvious reason that I think most people don't like
7 listening to commercials, although some of them are
8 entertaining the first time you hear them I guess. But
9 generally we don't like listening to them.
10 1079 I think, secondly, we feel that the
11 need for a commercial radio station to finance
12 themselves with commercials pushes them in a certain
13 direction, and it pushes them of course into the
14 direction of pleasing people perhaps who have the most
15 purchasing power or are the most susceptible to
16 commercials, or whatever, and it is not obvious that
17 those people are quite in the -- or that the
18 distribution of those people is quite the same as the
19 distribution of other tastes in society. So we think
20 having a non-commercial station which can appeal to
21 other tastes is quite attractive.
22 1080 Thirdly, we very much like the mix of
23 programs on the CBC or at least on Radio One. Most
24 other commercial radio stations tend to specialize in
25 one thing or another, and to us it is very important to
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1 have this mix of programs. There are music programs,
2 and of course there are a number of types of programs
3 that just don't seem to exist anywhere else, things
4 like As It Happens and Ideas, shows like that which
5 seem to us to be terribly attractive and which you just
6 don't see elsewhere.
7 1081 I guess we particularly like the mix
8 of local and national news which we get on Radio One
9 because other -- you know, in Edmonton I think you
10 particularly need local news. It is helpful to know
11 what the temperature is in the morning before you go
12 out, and that sort of thing. Yet we very much, as I
13 have said before, like the national nature of much of
14 the news, et cetera.
15 1082 The fourth thing I would like to turn
16 to is that we value very highly the quality of the
17 news. I think the CBC, of all the Canadian networks --
18 or of all the Canadian radio stations, including the
19 other -- I guess there isn't really much in the way of
20 broadly defined radio networks, but puts a lot into
21 having a good news service and we value that very much.
22 We have an interest in other places in the world, et
23 cetera, and we find that the CBC news is really very
24 attractive. I think they need to have a national
25 network and need to be supported in that.
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1 1083 Finally, I guess we like the general
2 quality and level of the comment or discussion or talk
3 shows. I'm not sure what to call them. Shows like
4 Basic Black and the Bill Richardson Show, they seem to
5 be much higher -- the general level of discussion and
6 comment seems to be much higher than one might get on
7 other stations.
8 1084 Now, I have a list of things to
9 mention under dislikes, but I think we perhaps don't
10 see those as very important because we are of course
11 pretty strong supporters of the CBC.
12 1085 I think we feel that despite what we
13 have just said that the quality of the news programs
14 has deteriorated a little. I think that budget cuts
15 have hit the CBC fairly hard, and we know that one of
16 the ways they have cut their budget is to remove some
17 of their foreign correspondents, and things like that.
18 We feel that is unfortunate.
19 1086 I think we also feel that in some
20 ways, particularly the Morning Show here, has moved a
21 little bit towards -- that the local radio station
22 feels it has to compete with the other commercial radio
23 stations, it has to try to bring up its membership in
24 some ways. I think this has pushed them in the
25 direction of trying to compete a little more by being a
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1 little more -- I'm not quite sure -- folksy or
2 something like that. I think we perhaps don't find
3 that to our tastes.
4 1087 Certainly I have spoke to a number of
5 my friends and colleagues before we came here and I
6 know a number of people who have been kind of driven
7 away from Radio One over towards Radio Two. I suppose
8 that perhaps that is not too bad from CBC's point of
9 view. I guess part of this is the general sort of idea
10 of having more talk show like shows in the sense of
11 inviting the listeners to ring up and that sort of
12 thing. We feel that that is perhaps not as important
13 as some other things.
14 1088 I guess lately of course a lot of
15 people must be concerned with the number of repeat
16 shows that the CBC has to have. The budget cuts have
17 hit them fairly hard. So even I who am not home all
18 day to listen to the radio or whatever hear more
19 frequently shows that I have heard before. It is too
20 bad that they are having to do that. But I guess that
21 is not your concern. That's the budget people's
22 concern.
23 1089 Finally, I know the CBC is concerned
24 about the fact that their audience is rather older and
25 they feel they should have younger listeners, but at
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1 the same time I think demography must be on their side
2 and maybe they shouldn't be so worried about the fact
3 that they have older listeners.
4 1090 Finally, just let me say a little bit
5 about the TV.
6 1091 The TV I think is certainly much less
7 important to us than the radio. I think lots of people
8 have commented on the fact that they feel the CBC has
9 perhaps misallocated the budget cuts in the sense that
10 they have hit the radio harder than the TV, which we
11 haven't been so happy with. But I think the TV also
12 provides examples of some of the things that I have
13 been talking about. The fact that they have to be
14 commercially competitive has meant that their shows are
15 much more like everyone else's shows, as far as I can
16 tell, and that they would be perhaps, at least to me,
17 missed less than with the radio by a far sight.
18 1092 I do however very much like the CBC
19 Newsworld channel and I support that more.
20 1093 Which reminds me. One of the things
21 I think is very good about the CBC radio lately has
22 been this new idea of having all the different foreign
23 broadcasters played through the night and I find that
24 to be very attractive.
25 1094 Thank you.
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1 1095 That's all I have to say.
2 1096 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you both very
3 much for taking the time and coming down and sharing
4 your views with us.
5 1097 MS PINSKY: I guess I will check once
6 again to see if Mr. Randy Boissonnault is here. Is
7 Mr. Randy Boissonnault in the room? No?
8 1098 Mr. Jason Lucien?
9 1099 THE CHAIRPERSON: We will take a
10 20-minute break and reconvene at 8:00.
11 --- Recess at 1940 / Suspension à 1940
12 --- Upon resuming at 2000 / Reprise à 2000
13 1100 MS PINSKY: Is there anyone wishing
14 to make any comments?
15 1101 I guess you are the only one. Do you
16 want to identify yourself, please.
17 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
18 1102 MR. BOISSONNAULT: My name is Randy
19 Boissonnault.
20 1103 I must first begin by sending the
21 regrets of my colleague Mr. Jason Lucien, who had every
22 intent of being here and was met with some extenuating
23 circumstances when he returned home from work. So he
24 will send his comments by written word, as opposed to
25 the spoken word.
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1 1104 Madam Chairperson, Commission
2 Members, thank you for allowing me to speak at this
3 public consultation regarding CBC radio and television.
4 As a boy, Hockey Night in Canada was a mainstay with my
5 dad, uncles and grandfather, and the CBC was also our
6 Sunday night window to The Wonderful World of Disney.
7 Since those days, the CRTC has probably renewed the
8 CBC's licence once or twice.
9 1105 As an adult, I now have a different
10 perspective on the CBC, one which supports its mandate
11 and the manner in which it is filling it. I think the
12 CBC does an admirable job of fulfilling its role as a
13 national broadcaster due to its programming, cultural
14 impact and connection to communities across the
15 country.
16 1106 At the regional level today the CBC
17 excels, not just as a broadcaster but also as a
18 presence in the community. As a former student
19 government leader responsible for communicating and
20 promoting student and university issues to the public,
21 I found the CBC's coverage and reports to be the most
22 accurate, balanced and professional of the television
23 and radio outlets. More recently, I have become a
24 convert to CBC One and Two.
25 1107 During the Delwin Green(ph) case and
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1 the controversy surrounding the provincial government's
2 decision to invoke or not invoke the notwithstanding
3 clause, I turned to CBC radio for the most balanced and
4 progressive coverage of the matter. I refused to wake
5 up in the morning to the opinions of commercial radio
6 announcers and listeners implying that the province
7 would careen toward a moral abyss if the government
8 refused to use the notwithstanding clause. The CBC
9 reflected the views of tolerant open-minded Albertans
10 who shared my view that human rights belonged to all
11 members of our society.
12 1108 When I travel to the lake on the
13 weekends, I enjoy programs ranging from Basic Black to
14 As it Happens. Upon our return, we tune to Radio Two
15 for a refreshing dose of classical music.
16 1109 In terms of national coverage in
17 programming, whenever I travel, the first station I
18 look for when settling into a hotel is Newsworld. I
19 enjoy the range of programs it offers and find the
20 national update it provides to be excellent.
21 1110 Finally, I prefer The National and
22 The Journal to all other newscasts. Moreover, I enjoy
23 the fact that I do not require cable to access such
24 high quality programming.
25 1111 With regard specifically to
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1 programming, Counterspin, The Passionate Eye and
2 Venture are all examples of programs with an edge that
3 no private broadcaster would even experiment with. The
4 town hall meetings and political fora organized by the
5 CBC add a useful dimension to our collective
6 conscience. These are informative valuable programs
7 and the creative of the CBC in creating and delivering
8 them is worth keeping.
9 1112 In meeting the demands of the future,
10 the CBC has already embraced one of the technologies
11 that will help define the new millennium by creating a
12 high profile Internet site. The CBC Internet site is
13 the busiest in Canada after wwwcanoe.com. The
14 demographics and draw that this site boasts has led our
15 company to consider purchasing banner ad space on the
16 CBC website out of all other sites out there to
17 diversify our marketing efforts.
18 1113 As a national broadcaster, I also
19 find it crucial to the integrity of the CBC that Radio
20 Canada International be maintained to provide
21 expatriate Canadians with news and information about
22 home. While studying in England during the 1995
23 referendum, Radio Canada International fed me and my
24 colleagues the nail-biting information we needed to
25 stay in tune with the developments at home.
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1 1114 I recommend that the CBC continue
2 unabashedly with presenting Canadian content, from The
3 Juneaus to Anne of Green Gables, Wind At My Back and
4 its quality news programming. As a viewer, I do not
5 feel threatened or disappointed when the network
6 chooses to buy American or international programs to
7 diversify their ratings.
8 1115 I further recommend that the CBC
9 should continue to produce, develop and promote
10 Canadian programming in general and more specifically
11 programming that reflects different cultures back to
12 the country.
13 1116 Je suis un ancien de la faculté
14 St-Jean de l'Université de l'Alberta. Le fait d'avoir
15 un réseau national qui offre des reportages de notre
16 communauté en français est excellent. En changeant du
17 CBC au RSC il est possible de voir les différences et
18 la similitude des pensées sur les grandes questions
19 politiques de nos jours.
20 1117 Les événements du Lac Meach, de
21 l'Accord de Charlottetown et de l'Union sociale je les
22 ai suivis par les réseaux et les pensées de gens ici en
23 Alberta et au Québec en sautant d'un poste à l'autre.
24 1118 This is the power of the CBC, to
25 reflect the pulse of Canada's linguistic duality and
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1 cultural diversity at a click of a remote control
2 button.
3 1119 I see the importance of providing
4 French news to the community to show itself what it has
5 accomplished in a province that is largely anglophone.
6 Could TVA-TV5 provide the same reflection? Certainly.
7 I applaud their arrival on the scene. The competition
8 and increased coverage will be welcome.
9 1120 But this private network will not
10 necessarily bring to Edmonton a dimension that
11 CHFR-CBXFT offers now, which is their connection to the
12 community.
13 1121 For example, I sing with the Faculty
14 St. Jean choir. This fall we are completing a 50th
15 anniversary compact disc project conceived by the choir
16 leaders and senior CBC staff. The project was born out
17 of the relationship the staff have to this community.
18 With a talented producer and expert technicians from
19 CHFA, we are producing a disc that will celebrate not
20 only our current success as a choir, but also the
21 presence and dynamism of the francophone community here
22 in Alberta.
23 1122 That is a powerful message for the
24 community and for the country. The CBC has played and
25 continues to play a crucial role in this and other
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1 similar projects.
2 1123 I heartily recommend the renewal of
3 the CBC licence. I look forward to improving the
4 nation's public broadcasting network well into the
5 future. The size of the CBC's budget, how it spends
6 it, and how many buildings it occupies is a matter for
7 the political process and meetings similar to this, but
8 designed to address the future shape of the CBC.
9 1124 I encourage the CBC and the
10 government to demonstrate increased leadership and
11 stewardship in providing Canadians with a public
12 broadcaster that reflects our accomplishments, our
13 struggles and our choices as a society to the entire
14 country.
15 1125 Thank you very much.
16 1126 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr.
17 Boissonnault.
18 1127 MS PINSKY: Is there anybody else in
19 the room who would like to make a presentation?
20 --- Pause / Pause
21 1128 MS PINSKY: I will just ask again:
22 Is there anybody else in the room who would like to
23 make a presentation?
24 1129 THE CHAIRPERSON: I think what we
25 will do then, if we have nobody else here who is
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1 presenting -- we are expecting perhaps some people as
2 late at 9 o'clock, but I would invite the CBC, if they
3 would like to reply, to do it now; or we can wait until
4 nine. It is their choice.
5 REPLY / RÉPLIQUE
6 1130 MR. ORCHARD: Thank you. I think I
7 will reply now, because I think the chances of speaking
8 to more of the people who have made the effort to come
9 out tonight is considerably greater if I address now.
10 1131 My name is Don Orchard. I am the
11 Regional Director for Radio for Alberta. My colleague
12 for television, Mr. Joe Novak, is in the room next door
13 listening to what people are saying in that room. We
14 have colleagues here from CHFA and other CBC services
15 as well.
16 1132 What I would like to do is thank
17 everyone who has made the effort to come out tonight.
18 The support expressed has been gratifying. The
19 concerns articulated are something that I will speak
20 about in a moment, and the ideas that were offered also
21 give us some pause for thought.
22 1133 I came here essentially to listen to
23 try and determine more about what we do that is right
24 that you like and more about what we do that you feel
25 needs to be improved upon. In radio and television we
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1 face considerable challenges. I will only speak for
2 radio. I know that over the last number of years we
3 have had our budget reduced by almost 30 per cent, and
4 it means that we have had to re-engineer the way that
5 we build our product. We have had to re-educate and
6 re-skill our workforce. It has been a giant cultural
7 leap, if you will, to turn ourselves inside out to try
8 and maintain quality and to try and maintain service.
9 1134 That said, I am really optimistic
10 because much of that hard work is behind us and we are
11 now beginning to see some benefit from it. I have
12 heard references to quality, and that is something that
13 Joe and I and others are working on constantly.
14 1135 We are also working to expand
15 service. Television, for example, in Calgary has a
16 brand new supper hour show that will go to air as soon
17 as the current labour difficulties are behind us. A
18 brand new revised Edmonton supper hour show is also
19 ready to go to air.
20 1136 In radio we now have local newscasts
21 every hour. We have expanded the amount of local
22 coverage and local material that we produce and ship to
23 the network and therefore is consequently heard by
24 Canadians. It is all about Alberta. We also have
25 expanded our areas of coverage to Grand Prairie and
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1 Lethbridge in the last year, and we have additional
2 plans for improving coverage of the region and
3 extending coverage to weekends and evenings, all the
4 things that we can make happen to serve listeners in
5 this province as soon as we go through the learning
6 curve of working with the new resource level.
7 1137 There is an important vehicle that we
8 provide for you outside of this one that I want to make
9 sure you are aware of. The CBC has an ombudsman's
10 office which will respond in a fair and balanced manner
11 to any concerns that you have about the product that we
12 produce and any CBC outlet, French, radio, television,
13 anywhere you call we can give you that number and you
14 can use that vehicle.
15 1138 I would like to thank the CRTC as
16 well for making this forum possible. It has been
17 informative for me and heartening, and I thank each and
18 every one of you for coming out and showing the will
19 and making the expressions that you did tonight.
20 1139 We will be following up on all of the
21 concerns that you have expressed in whole, and we will
22 be following up with you individually as well, to ask
23 you questions, if there are things that we don't think
24 we fully comprehend.
25 1140 Thank you very much.
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1 1141 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
2 much.
3 1142 I think what I will do is make some
4 remarks, not concluding remarks. I certainly would
5 invite any of you who want to wait to wait until 9
6 o'clock. However, I realize that many of you want to
7 be on your way. I think we have two more presenters
8 scheduled who have not yet appeared.
9 1143 I would like to thank the CBC but
10 also to all the people who appeared here today and in
11 fact all across the country to share their views with
12 us about the CBC.
13 1144 As I mentioned earlier, we will be
14 issuing a Public Notice later this month with respect
15 to the hearings we are holding in Hull on the 25th of
16 May regarding the terms and conditions of the CBC's
17 licence renewals for both radio and television.
18 1145 There will be an opportunity at that
19 time for anybody who is interested to submit written
20 comments to us. The deadline for written submissions
21 is the 30th of April. I invite anybody to do it.
22 1146 Once again, I would like to thank
23 everybody who has come out. It certainly is very
24 informative and helpful to those of us at the CRTC and
25 Commission to hear the views of Canadians on this and
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1 on many other topics. Whenever we do these
2 consultations, they are very enlightening, informative,
3 and remind us why it is we do what we do and why it is
4 we enjoy what we do.
5 1147 I would also like to thank at this
6 point the translators, although we need to keep you on
7 duty for a while; and the technical people; the court
8 scenographer; and the staff. Thank you very much.
9 1148 As I say, I invite you all to stay in
10 the event that more presenters show up.
11 --- Pause / Pause
12 1149 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes, sir.
13 --- Off microphone / Sans microphone
14 1150 MS PINSKY: What this proceeding is
15 looking into is the applications on the renewal.
16 Basically, the Commission can only exercise the powers
17 that it has under Statute, and under that statute for a
18 CBC licence to be revoked -- in other words, not to be
19 renewed --
20 1151 The Commission does not have the
21 power to do that unless there is actually the consent
22 of the CBC.
23 1152 What this proceeding is about, as
24 Commissioner Grauer just said, is looking at the terms
25 and conditions of the renewal; looking at perhaps the
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1 term of the renewal, as well as more programming
2 issues. In fact, the Public Notice that Commissioner
3 Grauer referred to that will be coming out at the end
4 of the month will be identify the specific issues that
5 will be at issue in that proceeding that the Commission
6 will consider.
7 1153 You may want to take a look at that
8 Public Notice, because it will give you a better idea
9 of the issues that are being considered. I understand
10 that all of the participants in these consultations
11 will be receiving a copy of the Public Notice.
12 1154 MR. ORCHARD: Just one quick
13 question, if I may, and I will use this so that others
14 can hear me.
15 1155 If people choose to direct a letter
16 to the CRTC, is there any special sort of
17 identification that has to accompany that letter so
18 that it gets to the right file?
19 1156 MS PINSKY: That's a good point. I
20 think it would be helpful if the intervenor filling our
21 the form or writing the letter directs their comments
22 to a specific application. The applications that will
23 be considered are the TV network, the CBC TV networks,
24 the CBC TV owned and operated stations, the radio
25 network, specialty services Newsworld and RDI. I think
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1 that is it.
2 1157 The Public Notice will identify the
3 specific applications, and the address where you should
4 send the intervention will be in that Public Notice.
5 1158 THE CHAIRPERSON: I think there is a
6 kit -- if most of you don't have it, it should be
7 available at the desk -- which gives you information
8 about the CRTC, our processes and how to write to us
9 and express your views.
10 1159 Thank you.
11 1160 MS PINSKY: It looks like we have
12 another presenter, Ms Nicolette Saina.
13 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
14 1161 MS SAINA: I just got here, so I need
15 to catch my breath.
16 1162 THE CHAIRPERSON: Take your time.
17 1163 MS SAINA: First of all, I would like
18 to thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak
19 here. I think it is a very Canadian exercise and I am
20 very happy to be a part of it.
21 1164 I would like to cover five things:
22 first of all, who I am; what is disturbing me re the
23 CBC; what is important to me; what the CBC has done for
24 me as a producer; and what I would like to see on the
25 CBC.
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1 1165 First of all, who I am: I grew up in
2 Edmonton and have lived here all through my childhood
3 life and most of my adult life. I have also resided
4 for short stints in Melbourne, Australia, Chicago,
5 Illinois and Calgary. I am an independent television
6 producer based here in the city, and I would like to
7 speak with that hat on. But I am also speaking to you
8 today as a mother of a teenager, as an Edmontonian, an
9 Albertan and a very proud Canadian.
10 1166 I approach my business very
11 entrepreneurially. I am open to the entire world for
12 business opportunities, yet I am very committed to
13 always reserving a solid chunk of my time and energy
14 toward creating distinctively Canadian programs.
15 1167 Three of the shows that I have
16 produced from here in Edmonton over the past six years
17 have aired on national prime time CBC, all on Canada
18 Day, and they have been financed from a variety of
19 sources: public, private, corporate and my own
20 personal money.
21 1168 But before I jump into the CBC of our
22 future, I would like to touch on my second point, which
23 is what is disturbing me about the CBC.
24 1169 I have just come back from a long
25 business trip. I was in Chicago and New York meeting
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1 with corporate sponsors for a PBS special that I have
2 produced and directed and that is airing in a few
3 months in the United States. The deeper I got into the
4 jungles of corporate America, the more Canadian I
5 became. I was really looking forward to coming here
6 and speaking today, mostly on the direction of the CBC.
7 But I was disturbed to come home to news of a serious
8 labour unrest, and when I caught up on my national
9 print reading I woke up to the disturbing reality that
10 CBC has few friends n Ottawa and in the rest of the
11 media.
12 1170 This bugs me because the CBC could be
13 inching toward the point of no return, and some of what
14 I am reading in the newspapers, in my opinion, is not
15 balanced or fair reporting.
16 1171 Unfortunately, to the average
17 Canadian, they will just ingest this into their brains
18 as truth, but to someone like myself it looks as though
19 they haven't done their homework and they clearly have
20 a bias.
21 1172 I would just like to address a couple
22 of the negative things I have been reading in the print
23 media.
24 1173 First of all, I have read on three
25 separate occasions in national media just the notion of
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1 $750 million thrown at one spot on the dial and oh, my
2 God, we only have less than 10 per cent of English TV
3 viewing audience. That could also be phrased as 7
4 cents a day, less than the cost of one cheap pair of
5 shoes per year.
6 1174 Also, the 9.6 share which they are
7 purporting to be bad -- they are saying it as if it
8 were a bad thing. But it is actually quite a good
9 thing, and I would like to put that into perspective.
10 1175 PBS's average prime time household
11 rating is 2.1 with each rating point representing
12 approximately 1 million television households in the
13 U.S., or 1 per cent out of a total of 100 million TV
14 households in the Nielsen universe.
15 1176 That is 2.1 million TV households on
16 an average evening tunes in to PBS, so their average
17 audience share is a slightly larger number. But it is
18 not even close to that of CBC's at 10 per cent.
19 1177 Actually, statistically, CBC is
20 closer to the audience ratings and share of Fox and NBC
21 and the other major networks than we are of PBS.
22 1178 I dug up some stats from January of
23 1998, and I looked at Fox, for instance, who is in
24 fourth place. They had a 12 share. These numbers are
25 actually lower than that, because all broadcasters at
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1 face drops.
2 1179 The whole notion that CBC is closer
3 in audience share to Fox and CBS and NBC than it is to
4 PBS, to me, was quite interesting. So the 9.6 per cent
5 that the CBC is attracting is actually an incredible
6 number, given that in the world of public broadcasting
7 I think the CBC is faring very well considering that
8 they are swimming in a sea of more and more channel
9 options. And given that 90 per cent of their
10 programming is fully Canadian fare, I think it is
11 amazing.
12 1180 I think that there is only a small
13 handful of North American broadcasters who have seen
14 their numbers slightly increase, or stay the same, and
15 CBC is among them.
16 1181 CTV's average prime time audience
17 share is only slightly higher. And considering that
18 they air a lot of U.S. programming, I think the results
19 of CBC's numbers are clear evidence that Canadians want
20 to tune into a voice that speaks to them and that
21 reflects their reality.
22 1182 Another thing that bothers me, in
23 catching up on my reading, is the whole notion that
24 with a pizza dish 500-channel world, do we really need
25 the CBC. I feel that in our increasingly global world,
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1 Canadians more than ever need solid cultural
2 institutions like the CBC, all the while welcoming
3 different perspectives of reality from all parts of the
4 world to help us increase our understanding and respect
5 for those who are different than us in every way, which
6 is very much a part of the Canadian psyche.
7 1183 This opening up to the world should
8 never be at the expense of our own identity. It is
9 also important to note that we are not unique as a
10 country in this concern, this cultural imperialism
11 concern. Clearly, no country possibly could survive
12 intact from the cultural onslaught of stuff that we
13 have had from the U.S. I think we are a very hardy
14 bunch to be where we are at, actually.
15 1184 My third topic is: What is important
16 to me at the CBC?
17 1185 I think CBC as a news source in
18 general, both radio and TV, is very important to me.
19 When I hear stories about CBS's respected 60 Minutes
20 killing a story on the tobacco industry because of a
21 Philip Morris advertising stranglehold, or ABC killing
22 a story investigating reports of paedophilia at
23 Disneyland because Disney owns ABC, I think to myself:
24 Thank God for the CBC. Let's never have situations
25 like that in Canada. Let's keep our safe haven of
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1 integral news that CBC provides and let's stand on
2 guard for it.
3 1186 This is not to take away from the
4 quality of journalism at, say, 60 Minutes. But there
5 are higher forces that exist that the average person
6 may not be aware of.
7 1187 At this time I would like to make a
8 similar point with other Canadian broadcasters related
9 to programming. I have dealt with several private
10 sector broadcasters, such as CFCF in Montreal and CFRN
11 here in Edmonton, and they are all wonderful Canadians,
12 and this comment is not a reflection of who they are or
13 their values as individuals.
14 1188 But the fact remains that when your
15 primary obligation when creating news or programming is
16 to shareholders' ratings, maximizing advertising
17 revenues and profits in general, sometimes these
18 journalists and broadcast decision-makers can find
19 their well-intentioned hands tied by forces that we
20 can't see.
21 1189 Another thing that is important to me
22 is the local newscasts. There is a new show introduced
23 in September, and I know stations across the country
24 have introduced new local newscasts which have been
25 quite polished and are receiving favourable reviews.
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1 But I feel that the momentum that is being built has
2 only being crippled by the recent strike.
3 1190 I just read an article today by Doug
4 Saunders of The Globe and Mail comparing the 1996 shows
5 and the 1999 shows. He feels that they are markedly
6 different, as I do too. I can't speak on behalf of
7 other cities, but I can certainly comment on Edmonton,
8 and he was commenting on Vancouver and Winnipeg, saying
9 that the shows are sober, smart, classy, modelled after
10 The National, blah, blah, blah, and that in many
11 cities, including Vancouver, the ratings have risen.
12 1191 I feel that they are heading in the
13 right direction with their audiences, and those
14 audiences will build in time.
15 1192 In my experience in Canada in a
16 variety of different capacities, I know that everybody
17 wants to work for the CBC in journalism. It is the
18 cream of the crop. It is the most respected, best
19 quality of journalism.
20 1193 What I see here in Edmonton is a
21 group of very talented integral journalists who are
22 crippled by the deep cuts. Their morale has been
23 damaged. How do you get the best out of people who
24 don't have the tools to do their job?
25 1194 No one can criticize CBC for too much
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1 fat right now. They have been on a fat-free diet for
2 quite a while. Just like our bodies, I think a little
3 bit grease to function properly is a necessity.
4 1195 I think the local newsrooms
5 specifically need a healthy equal to industry standard
6 environment in which their significant talents can
7 flourish.
8 1196 The first topic is what the CBC has
9 done for me as a producer.
10 1197 Six or seven years ago I did a little
11 production with my nine-year-old son at the time. It
12 was something that I paid for out of my own pocket. We
13 went across the country, and he interviewed 42 other
14 nine-year-olds from all walks of life: rich, poor,
15 black, white. He interviewed them, and they chatted
16 about things like the difference between Americans and
17 Canadians, what they liked best about Canada, blah,
18 blah, blah.
19 1198 As I said, I initially paid for this
20 out of my own pocket.
21 1199 I was very fortunate to attract the
22 co-production partnership of the NFB after I came back
23 to Edmonton. My big dream is to have just one national
24 airing. I thought Canadians would be interested and
25 amused by this, because it is actually quite funny and
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1 provocative. They had some interesting little pearls
2 of wisdom.
3 1200 My first meeting was at CTV in
4 Toronto, and they didn't find merit in it. Their
5 concerns were about ratings, audiences, advertising, et
6 cetera. But the CBC went on to embrace it. They
7 helped reshape it for their TV audience.
8 1201 To make a very long story short, it
9 is now the top selling educational video in Canada.
10 Six or seven years later, it is still a big-time
11 seller. It has had 50 airings on a variety of public
12 and private stations. It is used in Japan and France,
13 at political science classes in universities that study
14 how countries politically socialize at their level, and
15 how the national psyches of children are developed at
16 that level.
17 1202 We went on to a second version, which
18 was just aired in 1998, where we revisited those same
19 kids as 14-year-olds. They were five years older. We
20 did flashbacks: how did they Canada had changed, and
21 all this stuff. That version the Royal Bank of Canada
22 contributed, in portion, to the financing, and they
23 bought a couple of videos for every school board in
24 Canada, which were just distributed a month or so ago.
25 1203 I loved the idea that different
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1 sectors of Canadian society could work together to get
2 every school board in Canada access to teenagers and
3 kids discussing things like Canadian identity, blah,
4 blah, blah.
5 1204 I am only mentioning all of this
6 because it was certainly the CBC that provided me with
7 that leg up, and I would not be doing what I am
8 doing -- it created a career for me essentially.
9 1205 I also have to add that the PBS show
10 I am doing is also a result of this kid's view of
11 Canada thing. An American producer approached me and
12 said they wanted to do the same thing in the United
13 States and would I direct it and be a part of it.
14 1206 We travelled to 50 states and chatted
15 with 100 10-and-11-year-olds, and it is airing in a few
16 months.
17 1207 What is so interesting to me is that
18 we asked the same questions in Canada and the United
19 States to these kids, and they answered questions
20 differently.
21 1208 For instance: What do you like best
22 about America? Kids unanimously said freedom; like
23 Pavlov's dog, just freedom. In Canada, the kids said
24 instantly things like: I like that it's safe and it's
25 peaceful here.
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1 1209 I couldn't help but think: Do you
2 really have freedom if you don't feel safe? And if you
3 are 100 times more likely to be a victim of a random
4 act of violence in the United States, and there are
5 more guns than people in that country, it is little
6 wonder that the kids answered the way they did.
7 1210 Anyway, it taught me a lot about
8 being a better human being and that maybe my own overt
9 patriotism is actually sort of a dangerous thing. So I
10 think it was a good thing to go through that. It is
11 very important to me to preserve, perpetuate the gentle
12 good feelings about what it means to be a Canadian.
13 1211 My fifth topic is what type of
14 programming I would like to see on the CBC.
15 1212 There is some statistic about kids
16 before they are in grade 12 seeing something like
17 100,000 acts of violence on their television sets. I
18 kind of like the idea of the CBC -- which I think there
19 already are that, to a large extent. But for them to
20 be quality TV, value oriented, where we know it is a
21 safe place, where we are not going to worry about that
22 sort of thing. I like the idea of them continuing to
23 take risks with programming but not with our younger
24 viewers. So take those lines very clear where their
25 risk taking starts and stops.
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1 1213 Lastly, what I think should be done
2 in general is that more regional programming air time
3 and development dollars would be a condition of their
4 licence renewal, so that would leave room for
5 innovation and experimenting.
6 1214 Dale Phillips from AMPIA spoke
7 earlier, and I don't have to repeat what he said. He
8 said it well.
9 1215 I would like, in general, just a
10 little bit more grease. As I said earlier, not a
11 fat-free radio and TV and news diet, but just a light
12 fat diet where just a little bit more grease so they
13 can do their jobs properly, everyone in the CBC. And
14 just maybe a little bit more work on the perception of
15 the CBC and clearly defining the roles so that
16 Canadians -- the two questions, what does it cost and
17 what are we getting; that Canadians are clear on that.
18 1216 If Canadians like and respect CBC as
19 I do, on masse, they will feel that their seven cents a
20 day has clear value.
21 1217 That's all I have to say. Thank you.
22 1218 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Ms
23 Saina, and congratulations on the success of your
24 shows.
25 1219 MS SAINA: Thank you.
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1 1220 MS PINSKY: Ms Valerie Warke is the
2 next presenter.
3 2040
4 1221 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I am having
5 great difficulty hearing. Is there anything you can do
6 about that?
7 1222 MS PINSKY: Yes. Perhaps the
8 presenters can put the mic closer and the technician
9 will turn up the sound.
10 --- Pause / Pause
11 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
12 1223 MS WARKE: Thank you and good
13 evening. I appreciate the opportunity to have a chance
14 to share what the CBC means in my life.
15 1224 I know you have been listening for
16 many hours, and you have heard many stories; but I
17 think for each of us the CBC is something very
18 personal. I am just here to tell you what it means to
19 me.
20 1225 I know that four generations of my
21 family have been enlightened and entertained and
22 nurtured by the CBC. I am sure that one of the first
23 melodies I ever sang as a child was the theme to
24 Rawhide. I remember it very well.
25 1226 My days now begin and end with CBC
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1 radio. It starts with Edmonton AM in the morning so I
2 can catch the news, the weather and all the latest
3 happenings, and it ends, if I can manage, after my day
4 of teaching, to stay awake that long, with Ideas and
5 Between the Covers, which is one of my favourites.
6 1227 If you were to go on a radio tour of
7 my life, you would find in the bedroom Radio One set
8 for that Morning Show; in the livingroom on the stereo
9 is Radio Two. I am still trying to get used to this
10 Radio One and Two; but the FM for Choral Concert, Take
11 Five, Jazz Beat, all those favourite shows. In the
12 kitchen is back to Radio One for Edmonton PM when I get
13 home from work, and the news and As it Happens, which I
14 can't imagine getting through the day without.
15 1228 I had that experience a couple of
16 weeks ago when the batteries in my radio died. It was
17 terrible for a few days to have to reorganize my life.
18 1229 In the car, of course, is switching
19 back and forth all the time from one to the other,
20 depending on the day and the hour and where I am. If
21 it is Saturday morning, it will be Arthur Black; if it
22 is Sunday afternoon, it will be Cross Canada Check-Up,
23 and so on.
24 1230 I am sure you are much the same.
25 1231 I feel that there are two major
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1 functions served by CBC radio which just cannot be
2 replaced by any other forum. First of all, CBC links
3 us from coast to coast to coast in this vast country of
4 ours. It is a bond between family; in my case from
5 Victoria to Quebec. Yours may be farther spread. We
6 know that we are listening to the same shows. I phone
7 my sister in Ottawa --
8 1232 In fact, last Easter I had the
9 privilege of being with her at a live broadcast of
10 Choral Concert. I know neither of us will forget that
11 experience.
12 1233 It connects not only families but
13 friends.
14 1234 I just have a short story to relate
15 about a time several years ago when my husband and I
16 were on our way to Toronto, then to drive to Guelph to
17 visit my father who was critically ill. We had had one
18 of those Murphy's law days, trying to get the flight,
19 trying to get there, renting a car, traffic in Toronto,
20 finding our way on the 401, going the wrong way and
21 then back to the right way. And finally, we were out
22 of enough traffic on our way to Guelph that we could
23 start to punch the radio dials in the rented car, and
24 we flipped through the usual advertising and country
25 music and all the rest and then suddenly the voice of
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1 Alan Maitland came across the airwaves reading a
2 Stephen Leacock story -- My Financial Career, I think
3 it was -- and suddenly the world seemed to make sense
4 again to us. It was like coming home. Both of us just
5 felt this link and connection because of what we were
6 listening to.
7 1235 The second major significance in my
8 life for the CBC is that it provides a vehicle for the
9 expression and enjoyment of Canadian arts and culture
10 and for the preservation of our diverse and rich
11 heritage. Where else are we going to hear coverage of
12 Nunavut, for example, or hear about the concerns of our
13 aboriginal people?
14 1236 Local, provincial and national
15 writers and actors and singers and instrumentalists we
16 can enjoy. They have a chance to be heard, to perform
17 for an audience, and to be appreciated.
18 1237 I have tuned in to hear Friends and
19 Family with the Edmonton symphony, the U of A Madrigal
20 Singers, sax man P.J. Perry(ph) on Katie Mallack's(ph)
21 show Pro Choral Canada(ph). These are artists of first
22 rate calibre that we would not hear without CBC radio.
23 1238 This music is a huge part of my life
24 and I am sure of yours.
25 1239 I am a teacher of grade 6, and today
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1 one of the words on our spelling list was "opinion".
2 So I gave it in a sentence saying that this evening I
3 was coming to give my opinion about the CBC, and my
4 students got quite excited about this. I found there
5 were some CBC fans of the future there. So I said to
6 them that if they would like, they could write their
7 opinion and leave a card for me to read. So I chose
8 three. I hope I have time to share them.
9 1240 The first is a young girl, 12, who
10 says:
11 "I think you should keep the CBC
12 television channel because I
13 really like the programs you
14 have like your movies, 'Road to
15 Avonlea' and my favourite, 'The
16 Simpsons'. My dad really likes
17 hockey, but if you take CBC away
18 he will have to turn to a
19 different station. So please
20 don't take it away." (As read)
21 1241 This one is from an 11-year-old
22 cellist:
23 "Classical music could be lost
24 forever! My mom wouldn't have
25 anything to listen to on the way
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1 to work, and we would all miss
2 listening to 'Quirks and Quorks'
3 on the weekend."
4 1242 And Jeff finishes:
5 "I think the federal government
6 should keep funding CBC radio
7 and television. I like CBC
8 radio because it has a lot of
9 interesting and funny programs
10 on the air and it keeps us
11 connected to the rest of
12 Canada." (As read)
13 1243 Believe me, this was not nurtured by
14 me at all. Just the word "opinion" was said.
15 "It is nice to hear things from
16 different parts of our country.
17 When I wake up in the morning,
18 it is always good to hear the
19 news before I leave for school.
20 The television station is great
21 too. It has a lot of great
22 programs as well, like 'Air
23 Farce'. It is Canada's national
24 TV and radio network, so don't
25 take it away. I think there is
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1 nothing to take the place of the
2 CBC." (As read)
3 1244 Thank you.
4 1245 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. And I
5 think you can reassure your students that we are here
6 to discuss the terms and conditions of renewal, so they
7 can be assured that there will be hockey for dad.
8 1246 MS WARKE: Thank you.
9 1247 MS PINSKY: Ms Joan Kneshe is the
10 next presenter.
11 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
12 1248 MS KNESHE: Like Valerie, I just want
13 to speak about the CBC from a very personal point of
14 view.
15 1249 After my university degrees were
16 over, I felt like my education was continuing through
17 what I read myself and through what the CBC could offer
18 to me.
19 1250 I recently read a book by Sandra
20 Sasneros(ph), a Mexican-American writer, who talked
21 about a boy on the street who always had a harmonica in
22 his mouth. She didn't ever hear him play it, but he
23 just breathed in and out through this harmonica. When
24 I read that, I felt like this is what the CBC was for
25 me: it was part of my breathing in and my breathing
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1 out.
2 1251 You push a button and you have
3 Writers and Company and where else would you hear about
4 an Egyptian writer that was jailed under Sudat's
5 government and ends up writer in residence at Duke
6 University. You push a button and you have As It
7 Happens, and where else would you hear about the people
8 that you only read about in the news.
9 1252 On Sunday afternoon you have Rex
10 Murphy's sardonic wit mixed with the chance for
11 Canadians to air their opinions in all their diversity.
12 1253 There is Quirks and Quarks, which
13 would satisfy your scientific interests and more. You
14 can laugh with Stewart McLean over the Canadian
15 Experience.
16 1254 Sunday morning is like the cultural
17 umbilical chord that connects me coast to coast with
18 other Canadians.
19 1255 There is Saturday Afternoon at the
20 Opera. Where else could you have opera in your kitchen
21 on a Saturday afternoon?
22 1256 My day always ends with Ideas. Where
23 else could you push a button and hear a Massey lecture?
24 1257 Thank you.
25 1258 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
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1 much.
2 1259 MS PINSKY: Ms Marlyn Wall is the
3 next presenter.
4 --- Off microphone / Sans microphone
5 1260 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes, by all means.
6 And you might want to put on both mics. I gather it is
7 a performance you have, is it?
8 PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
9 1261 MS WALL: We just have a short
10 introduction. Thank you for having us. It is a
11 wonderful opportunity.
12 1262 Like an adolescent, Canada struggles
13 for its identity, and we believe that the CBC plays an
14 integral part in defining that identity, binding us
15 together in our diversities.
16 1263 We are the Faded Blues. Anita
17 Knorborg is a secretary. She was raised nears Olds,
18 Alberta. Marlene Rankel is a psychologist. She was
19 raised at Flin Flon, Manitoba. I am Marlyn Wall, and I
20 am a retired nurse. I was raised at Shaunavon,
21 Saskatchewan. That is near Eastend.
22 1264 Each of us was born the same year as
23 the CBC, 1936. Growing up, our lives were very
24 influenced in those small towns by the CBC in each of
25 the Prairie provinces. And like children across the
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1 country, we became very familiar with the tune English
2 Country Gardens that was played every day on the CBC.
3 We think it was for the noon show, but we are not quite
4 sure which program that was.
5 1265 So, in 1996, as part of the CBC's
6 sixtieth year celebration, we wrote a little song about
7 the valuable CBC, to the tune of English Country
8 Gardens. We think our song addresses your four
9 questions.
10 1266 Here's our song.
11 1267 I am sure that some of you are about
12 our age and will remember the tune, so we invite you to
13 join us. We could do it twice if you want to get to
14 know it well.
15 The Faded Blues:
16 How many years have we been around
17 Sixty two just like the CBC
18 We'll tell you now it's the most familiar sound
19 Reaching everyone, from sea to sea
20 Recall Don Messer's Jubilee
21 The Happy Gang and Fibber McGee
22 Binding all Canadians, together day by day
23 From Hockey Night in Canada
24 To world Olympic Games
25 C.B.C. has shown us how to play
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1 From Atlantic to Pacific, C.B.C. has been the most
2 Important source of information
3 Uniting all Canadians at work from coast to coast
4 Who listen to this broadcast station.
5 Miners, farmers, fishermen
6 In little fishing villages,
7 City folk and Prairie folk at home or far away
8 Joined together by the air waves
9 That help us all belong
10 C.B.C. united we will stay
11 C.B.C., united we will stay.
12 1268 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, ladies.
13 1269 MS WALL: I just want to end by
14 saying that I think one of the wonderful moments on CBC
15 was one morning when Peter Gzowski had fiddlers from
16 across the country, from the very far east to the very
17 far west, and they were all playing Maple Sugar. It is
18 a moment that you may have heard. It was wonderful.
19 1270 Thank you.
20 1271 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very
21 much.
22 1272 MS PINSKY: I will ask one last time:
23 Is there anyone else in the room who would like to make
24 a presentation?
25 --- No response / Pas de réponse
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1 1273 THE CHAIRPERSON: We will adjourn for
2 ten minutes. As I said, I think we were expecting
3 someone perhaps as late as 9 o'clock. If anyone would
4 like to stay, we invite you to stay.
5 1274 We will be back in ten minutes, in
6 any event.
7 --- Recess at 2050 / Suspension à 2050
8 --- Upon resuming at 2100 / Reprise à 2100
9 1275 THE CHAIRPERSON: Once again,
10 everybody, thank you so much for being here.
11 1276 Thank you to the translators,
12 technicians, court reporter/stenographer, Madam Pinsky,
13 the staff, CBC, and in particular to all the people who
14 have taken the time to come out and share their views
15 with us.
16 1277 Thank you so very much.
17 --- Whereupon the consultation concluded at 2105 /
18 Le consultation se termine à 2105
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