Official Languages committee  I understand that it's important for the Treasury Board Secretariat to have general information. We can provide that. However, I can assure you that we meet our obligations under the Official Languages Act on a daily basis.

Official Languages committee  I want to begin by saying that our organization was very happy to have Mr. Fraser at our hearings. That adds something to our public record. All the issues he raised were discussed during the hearing, but I cannot tell you what we will do about them because we are still debating.

Official Languages committee  During the hearings, our role is to build a public record. We put all that together, we take into consideration all the elements and we try to make a decision that will allow us to best achieve the legislative objectives. However, our debates are ongoing. So I have to be careful.

Official Languages committee  Exactly. We cannot talk about CBC, so let's talk about other stakeholders. I often speak in terms of reflection, which is divided into two categories. There is what I call mirror reflection, where the community sees itself. There is also window reflection, where the community sees its projection in the rest of Canada.

Official Languages committee  As I said to Mr. Dion a bit earlier, the plan is no longer in effect, but we are working on a new plan that will be made public once it has been completed.

Official Languages committee  Certain things can be done with regard to renewals. In the past, commitments have become conditions for the next renewal.

Official Languages committee  Two applications have been submitted to us: one by TV5 and another one by what people call “Accents”. They will be dealt with at the hearings in April. We published the notice of the proceeding a few weeks ago. I think the deadline for submissions was last night. I don't know how many stakeholders have submitted requests, but I know that, overall, there are about 17,000 interventions for the April hearing.

Official Languages committee  Everyone will have an opportunity to make their case.

Official Languages committee  That's correct.

Official Languages committee  It's a little bit more complicated than that. Operators are obliged to provide us with information on a regular basis. For instance, television services give us their TV logs, and we have a system to evaluate whether they are in fact broadcasting the amount of Canadian content they are supposed to, and so forth.

Official Languages committee  The vast majority of broadcasters comply with their conditions of licence. A small number sometimes get into trouble. Unfortunately, they tend to be the smaller players, the less sophisticated players. That's why we have a small broadcaster group that helps them understand their regulatory obligation.

Official Languages committee  Thank you.

Official Languages committee  Yes.

Official Languages committee  You're referring to the 1999 TV policy, which at one point took a perspective that we would get rid of the spending requirements and go to a number of hours of Canadian content in prime time. Recently, after reviewing all that, the commission went back to a spending requirement.

Official Languages committee  It's a mixture. For instance, the CBC station in Moncton, let's say, would take a lot of the network programming, but it would also have some percentage of locally produced shows.