Bill C-11

Online Streaming Act

An Act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Broadcasting Act to, among other things,
(a) add online undertakings — undertakings for the transmission or retransmission of programs over the Internet — as a distinct class of broadcasting undertakings;
(b) specify that the Act does not apply in respect of programs uploaded to an online undertaking that provides a social media service by a user of the service, unless the programs are prescribed by regulation;
(c) update the broadcasting policy for Canada set out in section 3 of the Act by, among other things, providing that the Canadian broadcasting system should
(i) serve the needs and interests of all Canadians, including Canadians from Black or other racialized communities and Canadians of diverse ethnocultural backgrounds, socio-economic statuses, abilities and disabilities, sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions, and ages, and
(ii) provide opportunities to Indigenous persons, programming that reflects Indigenous cultures and that is in Indigenous languages, and programming that is accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities;
(d) enhance the vitality of official language minority communities in Canada and foster the full recognition and use of both English and French in Canadian society, including by supporting the production and broadcasting of original programs in both languages;
(e) specify that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (the “Commission”) must regulate and supervise the Canadian broadcasting system in a manner that
(i) takes into account the different characteristics of English, French and Indigenous language broadcasting and the different conditions under which broadcasting undertakings that provide English, French or Indigenous language programming operate,
(ii) takes into account, among other things, the nature and diversity of the services provided by broadcasting undertakings,
(iii) ensures that any broadcasting undertaking that cannot make maximum or predominant use of Canadian creative and other human resources in the creation, production and presentation of programming contributes to those Canadian resources in an equitable manner,
(iv) promotes innovation and is readily adaptable toscientific and technological change,
(v) facilitates the provision to Canadians of Canadian programs in both official languages, including those created and produced by official language minority communities in Canada, as well as Canadian programs in Indigenous languages,
(vi) facilitates the provision of programs that are accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities,
(vii) facilitates the provision to Canadians of programs created and produced by members of Black or other racialized communities,
(viii) protects the privacy of individuals who aremembers of the audience of programs broadcast, and
(ix) takes into account the variety of broadcasting undertakings to which the Act applies and avoids imposing obligations on any class of broadcasting undertakings if that imposition will not contribute in a material manner to the implementation of the broadcasting policy;
(f) amend the procedure relating to the issuance by the Governor in Council of policy directions to the Commission;
(g) replace the Commission’s power to impose conditions on a licence with a power to make orders imposing conditions on the carrying on of broadcasting undertakings;
(h) provide the Commission with the power to require that persons carrying on broadcasting undertakings make expenditures to support the Canadian broadcasting system;
(i) authorize the Commission to provide information to the Minister responsible for that Act, the Chief Statistician of Canada and the Commissioner of Competition, and set out in that Act a process by which a person who submits certain types of information to the Commission may designate the information as confidential;
(j) amend the procedure by which the Governor in Council may, under section 28 of that Act, set aside a decision of the Commission to issue, amend or renew a licence or refer such a decision back to the Commission for reconsideration and hearing;
(k) specify that a person shall not carry on a broadcasting undertaking, other than an online undertaking, unless they do so in accordance with a licence or they are exempt from the requirement to hold a licence;
(l) harmonize the punishments for offences under Part II of that Act and clarify that a due diligence defence applies to the existing offences set out in that Act; and
(m) allow for the imposition of administrative monetary penalties for violations of certain provisions of that Act or of the Accessible Canada Act .
The enactment also makes related and consequential amendments to other Acts.

[Marla Boltman]

If I may, I guess what you're asking is why Bill C-11 matters to us.

We share the longest international border with the most dominant power and most prolific producer of entertainment content in the world, and for better or for worse, American content has an incredible influence over our culture. However, history has taught us time and time again that failure to protect and promote our culture and our identity is a recipe for foreign domination.

Our ability to protect and promote Canadian culture and identity happens through our sharing of stories, be they film, television, journalism or music. By whatever audiovisual means, the survival of our stories has always rested on government support, and Bill C-11 will allow us to remain in control over our culture and our stories by shoring up that support.

Requiring contributions from foreign tech giants that extract billions of dollars from our country will help sustain our industry while driving investment and innovation in the creation of Canadian content that continues to reflect our diversity of voices and who we are as Canadians. Foreign contributions will level the playing field between Canadian broadcasters and foreign platforms. Frankly, it sends a message to the world that Canada is open for business, but there are no more free rides. If you benefit from the system, you must contribute to it.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'd like go to Ms. Boltman now.

Ms. Boltman, the Friends' brief talks about the tens of thousands of jobs lost over the last few years and cites that Google and Facebook made $7.5 billion in Canada from digital ads in 2019.

Is this why Friends is pressing the committee to adopt Bill C-11? Is it that we're seeing, in addition to its being an uneven playing field, that we're essentially hoovering money out of the country and some of it should come back to actually create Canadian productions and provide for the ability of Canadians to tell stories, both to themselves and to the world?

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Very quickly, you're saying that Canadians are very successful in being able to reach a global audience. Obviously they depend on that. What will Bill C-11 do to that ability?

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I also want to thank the witnesses for joining us today.

I will start with you, Ms. Messier. I know you have been carefully following our discussions on Bill C‑11, and even on Bill C‑10, since the beginning. This is an issue that is important to you. I would like to hear your thoughts on the situation.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Do you really believe that this bill will help ensure that, going forward, if we put in the right type of legislation...? I did hear you say that you have some suggestions on some amendments. But the overall spirit of C-11, from your perspective, would it be a good thing for Canadians in general?

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you so much, Madam Chair.

Thank you so much to all the witnesses for joining us. This has been a very fascinating conversation.

For me, C-11 is about fairness, equality, inclusiveness, openness and respect. I think maintaining our Canadian culture through film and television is something that we as Canadians, as lawmakers and as citizens should be striving to do.

Ms. Boltman from Friends, I think the best line I've heard this evening was “crashing on our cultural couch”. Thank you for sharing that, and I'll keep that in the back of my mind as we proceed.

I wanted to ask a few questions of Ms. Jenkinson from BSO.

We had a meeting earlier this week and heard from some witnesses that government should not be involved in the regulation of any type of broadcasting. In particular, we heard from one witness that some online streaming giants not wanting to carry such unique voices as OUTtv was capitalism at work, that it was fine and that the government should not be ensuring diversity in those voices.

I am completely opposite to that. I think that, in a democratic process, we should use democracy and the ability for government, through law, regulation and directives, to ensure that we have good Canadian content that reflects Canada today.

I want to get your opinion on that statement from a witness earlier this week.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

That's a good point, because last year with TSN Radio, you flipped the switch on three markets, eliminated it in seconds, and then you went to comedy channels. You did this across the country, from Vancouver onward. You hold several radio properties, which are under Bill C-11. It's disrespectful to the listeners of TSN Radio, which you own in the Vancouver markets and so on. You cut Hamilton overnight and flipped the switch on the comedy channels without any input from the CRTC on licensing. It was just done. Jobs were lost and people were escorted out of the business. This is what we're seeing.

Yes, I'm going to give you kudos on Canadian news. You've exceeded your obligations in most markets. You have it in the morning, at noon, five and seven and late at night in many markets, so I will give you kudos for that. You've exceeded the hours required by the CRTC for news coverage.

At the same time.... You can talk about Canadian production, but I see very little Canadian production between seven and 10, which is the prime time. I see The Big Bang Theory over and over again at night. It's on three or four times.

Can we see any Canadian productions in the seven to 10 slot to promote Canadian culture, so that you don't have to go to L.A. and buy those foreign competitor shows that you're now up against, from the big, foreign people you just talked about? Is there any hope that Canadian programming from seven to 10 can rival other programming that people can see, other than the NHL?

[John Lawford, Executive Director and General Counsel, Public Interest Advocacy Centre]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Public Interest Advocacy Centre defines the consumer interest in broadcasting as ensuring that consumers benefit from access to a wide variety of programming in the broadcasting system that offers choice in an affordable manner.

Unlike in 1991, consumers now pay for almost all broadcasting, whether with money or with personal information, including their online subscriptions, cable TV and video on demand, delivered by a BDU, or over the top, via the Internet. Consumers are now a key stakeholder in this debate. We are of equal importance to creators, platforms and producers.

We believe that extending CanCon financial support requirements to online services such as Netflix or Amazon Prime, and even social media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook, when used as program distributers, are generally supported by Canadians.

However, the bill grants the CRTC discretion to set the financial and potential other obligations of online undertaking registrants, no matter their size or type, provided they distribute any programs, which is overbroad. To solve this, we support an amendment to the bill exempting small online undertakings below a high Canadian revenues threshold, perhaps $150 million, from financial and other conditions. This threshold would not affect registration or information requirements.

Consumers naturally resist the insertion of CanCon into automated plays or algorithmic suggestions of platforms such as YouTube, and digital first creators are concerned that such discoverability tools will backfire and reduce their audiences.

PIAC believes that the user-generated content problem can be addressed by redefining “discoverability” as not one concept, but two: static discoverability and dynamic discoverability.

Bill C-11's only new mandatory broadcasting policy requirement is proposed new paragraph 3(1)(r), which states:

online undertakings shall clearly promote and recommend Canadian programming, in both official languages as well as in Indigenous languages, and ensure that any means of control of the programming generates results allowing its discovery;

Clearly, discoverability is key to the drafters and must stay in some form. This policy objective mandates both static discoverability and dynamic discoverability. The first half could be satisfied by a banner ad on YouTube that simply links, upon a consumer's click, to selected CanCon. It is static. It is unobtrusive and likely unobjectionable to consumers, but still clearly promotes and recommends CanCon.

The second half of the new policy objective is dynamic. It requires AI prediction tools to insert a CanCon video or song into a user's auto-play feature or to dynamically suggest links. It is intrusive and disruptive to the user's expectations and experience. It is overkill to achieve the goal of “promote and recommend” CanCon. It is even more intrusive than the exhibition requirements on traditional broadcasters, because the online world is a world of abundance and consumer choice, not scarcity, where mandated exhibition makes more sense.

Digital first creators are rightly concerned that the bill's requirement to use dynamic discoverability will backfire and actually demote the importance of, and user engagement with, their content. Canadian users who are involuntarily exposed to discoverability links will avoid or react negatively, thereby signalling to the AI globally and in Canada to demote the content.

The solution is to require only static discoverability tools and to require any Canadian content creator who wishes to have their content promoted, even by static discoverability, to apply to a new CanCon authorization authority, likely the CRTC. This will allow digital first creators the choice to continue to operate untouched by this entire regime, which PIAC believes they want, or to have their content promoted in the limited sense of static discoverability.

PIAC recommends amending proposed paragraph 3(1)(r) to remove the last 15 words, thereby directing the CRTC to satisfy the bill's discoverability requirement with only static discoverability tools.

I welcome your questions. Thank you.

[Marla Boltman, Executive Director, FRIENDS]

Thank you. I'm going to switch to good evening now, Madam Chair.

Honourable members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to speak with you today.

I've had the pleasure of meeting some of you in advance of this bill's arrival at committee but for those I have not met, my name, again, is Marla Boltman, and I am the new executive director of Friends.

We have over 360,000 supporters, Canadian citizens from coast to coast to coast, who stand up proudly for Canadian culture in film, in TV, in music and in journalism, really in every space and place we can share our stories at home and abroad.

While I am new to the organization, I bring with me both a content production and entertainment law background, which for more than 20 years I have used to help advance the interests of those working in the Canadian cultural industries.

The last time my organization appeared before you to talk about Bill C-10 our name was Friends of Canadian Broadcasting. Today we are more simply called Friends. This is quite fitting because I'm not just here to talk about broadcasting. I'm also here as a friend of Canadian storytelling and Canadian cultural sovereignty, both of which will be affected by the work of this committee when this bill is adopted. I say “when” because I want to clearly and unequivocally state that, while it's not perfect, we support the adoption of Bill C-11 and believe it can be improved with some minor amendments.

One of the bill's imperfections lies in its silence when it comes to addressing the CBC's mandate. We are very disappointed by this, but a conversation about the modernization of our nation's public broadcaster clearly requires more singular attention, something that the government has committed to doing via Bill C-18, which we welcome.

In the meantime, I don't want to use these few minutes to give those who would like to see this legislation stalled any more reasons to pause, to prevaricate, to do nothing, because if we do nothing, how our stories are told, who gets to tell them and how Canadian audiences access these stories will all be decisions made by foreign tech giants, billion-dollar companies who have effectively been crashing on our cultural couch for almost a decade, paying nothing toward the structures and systems that allow Canadians to tell their own stories.

With the adoption of Bill C-11 we, as a country, will finally send a long-overdue notice to these foreign tech giants that their rent is due, but we cannot stop there. Bill C-11 must prioritize Canadian ownership and control of our broadcasting system as well as the content created to serve it. If it does not, these companies will not be paying us fair rent for the use of our home. Rather, their contributions may simply amount to a down payment on a broadcasting system that they could potentially own and control.

Our amendment to proposed paragraph 3(1)(a), jointly submitted with the Coalition for the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, is meant to address this ownership and control issue. As currently drafted, the language in proposed paragraph 3(1)(a) is a massive retreat of Canadian public policy. If we don't support our own media and preference over foreign media, then we are ultimately relegating ourselves to having no Canadian media at all.

We need only look to the decimation of the Canadian local news sector for a preview of what is to come if we do not take care of our media institutions, which is why support for Friends' amendment to proposed subsection 11.1(1), dealing with expenditure requirements, can lay the foundation for a stronger, more viable local broadcast news sector. It would help ensure that the cuts we've seen to local print outlets across Canada do not start coming to local radio and TV and that broadcasters have the resources to maintain quality local coverage.

In closing, I would like to remind this committee that the modernization of the Broadcasting Act isn't just about protecting industry and jobs. It's what Canadians want, Canadians who have sent a clear message to Ottawa that streaming platforms should contribute to Canadian storytelling and reflect our stories back to us. They think this is fair and we agree.

Thank you for your time and consideration on this incredibly important matter.

I am happy to answer any questions you have.

[Reynolds Mastin]

Change is needed to correct this market imbalance. The bill should ensure that the CRTC is empowered to require and enforce collective terms of trade between these buyers and independent Canadian producers. Terms of trade would provide a code of baseline conditions to be used in good faith negotiations between the parties when licensing a program.

This is not a novel solution. In 2003, the U.K. adopted terms of trade in its own Communications Act. Less than a decade later, the value of the U.K. independent production sector had almost tripled. In fact, this tool has been so successful that the U.K. government recently announced that it would maintain and modernize terms of trade. Given its success not only in the U.K. but also in France and Germany, we are confident that the adoption of a terms of trade amendment in Bill C-11 would result in similar success here in Canada.

Our third and final amendment would be to close a legislative loophole that generally excludes telecom service providers from the application of the Broadcasting Act. This exclusion no longer makes sense at a time when ISP and wireless services are playing an ever greater role in our broadcasting system.

Today Canadians watch content through their phones, tablets, laptops, and yes, also in their living rooms on TVs but those televisions increasingly stream programs over the Internet. The CRTC should have the ability to determine whether and how telecom providers could contribute to the creation of Canadian programming and the policy directions should instruct the CRTC to do this in a way that protects consumers and upholds the principle that those who benefit from our system should contribute to it.

In closing, we applaud the government for the introduction of Bill C-11 and look forward to responding to any questions you may have.

[Reynolds Mastin, President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Media Producers Association]

Good afternoon, Madam Chair and committee members.

My name is Reynolds Mastin, and I am the president and CEO of the Canadian Media Producers Association. The CMPA represents more than 600 companies across Canada engaged in the production of Canadian programming.

With me today is Catherine Winder, a member of the CMPA board and the CEO of the Vancouver-based production company, Wind Sun Sky Entertainment. Catherine has built a prolific career as a multiplatform adaptor of intellectual property, with such projects as Star Wars, The Angry Birds Movie and Invincible, to name a few. Thank you for inviting us to appear today.

The CMPA supports the passage of Bill C-11. The modernization of our broadcasting regulatory framework is critical to maintaining our national sovereignty, promoting a diversity of voices in our system and serving Canadian audiences.

[Joan Jenkinson, Executive Director, Black Screen Office]

Good afternoon.

My name is Joan Jenkinson. I'm the executive director of the Black Screen Office, which is a non-profit, non-partisan advocacy association.

Our mission is to make Canadian screen industries equitable and free of anti-Black racism and to empower Black Canadians working within the screen industries to thrive and share their stories.

The BSO was founded in the fall of 2020 with the support of Telefilm Canada and the Canada Media Fund in response to Canadians' growing awareness of the need to take action to fight anti-Black racism. By this fall, the BSO will have released three research studies. One is on creating authentic and inclusive content. A second report will be Canada's very first race-based audience survey. A third report is a comprehensive labour market study of Black professionals in the Canadian screen industries. We also support Black producers and creatives with content incubators, by creating pipelines to decision-making roles in the sector and in attending international film festivals and markets. We work with industry partners to fund Black content creators.

Thank you for inviting the BSO to talk to you today about Bill C-11—the bill to amend the Broadcasting Act. The BSO supports the Racial Equity Media Collective's submission to this committee with proposed amendments to the bill. We agree with others about the need to ensure that all the players who work within the Canadian broadcasting system that compete for Canadian audiences and earn revenues from it should also contribute to it. However, the bill could be improved with a few small consequential amendments.

Canadians of all backgrounds have not had access to programming within the Canadian broadcasting system that authentically reflects the diversity of this country. The proposed amendments in Bill C-11 will prioritize greater equity and inclusion. We welcome Bill C-11's references to serving the needs and interests of racialized Canadians, but wherever the word “racialized” is used, we ask that it be replaced with “Black and racialized”. We request this amendment as recognition there has historically been greater oppression of Black Canadians and greater barriers to inclusion for them than with other racialized Canadians.

For example, in the 2019 Statistics Canada survey, 45% of Black Canadians expressed that they experienced discrimination in the past five years compared to 27% from other visible minorities. This discrimination can play out in education, health care, employment, housing and, yes, the Canadian screen industries. There needs to be a targeted strategy to break down these systemic barriers and fight anti-Black racism. Lumping Black Canadians in with all other racialized Canadians risks policy and regulation being adopted that do not consider the specific needs and challenges of Black communities.

I would also like to address comments I've heard at this committee that under-represented Canadians have access to unregulated platforms, such as YouTube, for content that reflects them. I would like to ask why Black Canadians should be limited to user-generated and short-form content found on YouTube and TikTok and not have access to longer form stories found in serialized dramas, sitcoms and documentaries that reflect their lives, experiences and interests.

It is true that Black Canadians have access to content from the U.S. and the U.K. that is created by Black screenwriters, directors and producers, but that content does not reflect the Canadian Black experience. This is important. Canadian Black communities are incredibly more diverse than African American communities. We consist of communities in Nova Scotia and southern Ontario that are older than Canada, newer communities made up of people from the Caribbean, and more recent communities from Africa. With limited exceptions, the many stories of these various communities are not being told.

Why can't there be everyday Black Canadians in romcoms, sitcoms, sci-fi series, kids' show and documentaries?

The Black Screen Office looks forward to the swift passage of Bill C-11, with the proposed amendments and the subsequent CRTC proceedings that will create a regulatory framework that will support the creation, delivery and promotion of more Canadian programming that reflects the lives and experiences of Black Canadians.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[Jonathan Daniels, Vice-President, Regulatory Law, BCE Inc.]

How did the regulatory regime enable it? Through bold regulatory decisions that were made over 50 years ago to harness the power of Hollywood for the greater good of Canada through creative regulatory measures that put Canadian broadcasters at the centre of the broadcasting ecosystem.

Licence rules required partnerships between foreign and Canadian broadcasters, creating such success stories as Discovery Canada, a partnership between Bell Media and Discovery. Another example is simultaneous substitution rules that ensure that broadcasters can monetize all the Canadian viewership and generated revenues that could be funnelled back into news and Canadian shows. These solutions were not always obvious. It took the vision and fortitude of your predecessors to bring our ecosystem to life.

Let's be clear. Today these rules no longer work. Our access to popular U.S. shows has become increasingly challenging and expensive. Foreign streamers are bidding up the costs of programming acquisition. Even more concerning is that major U.S. studios have either cut out domestic broadcasters all together or are about to do so. Disney+ and Paramount+ are already using their own streaming platforms to reach Canadians directly. Others like HBO have launched their own OTT platforms in the U.S. and could still choose to do so in Canada. With the ability to go directly to Canadians on an OTT basis, we are starting to see these platforms refuse to sell us their content all together.

Why does this matter? It matters because it puts all we do—and by "we", I mean all that Canadian broadcasters do—at risk. Canadian broadcasters produce Canadian news that quite simply is essential to our culture, to protecting our democracy and to our national sovereignty. Let's not delude ourselves. The entire Canadian broadcasting ecosystem is funded by profits generated from foreign content. We cannot expect broadcasters to continue to produce and support the Canadian content that we do without access to foreign content and partnering with foreign players.

We can ensure the central role of Canadian broadcasters by securing access to foreign content. We can also incentivize foreign streamers to partner with Canadian broadcasters, much like foreign linear services have done for decades. We believe Bill C-11 should explicitly enable this. That is why we are proposing two important amendments to clauses 3 and 5 of the act today.

Finally, we wanted to let you know we are supportive of both the CAB's and Unifor's proposed amendments. A copy of them, as well as our specific amendments to clauses 3 and 5 of the act, are attached in our submission that we sent to the clerk.

Thank you for the opportunity to present our views. We look forward to answering your questions.

[Karine Moses, Vice-Chair Québec and Senior Vice-President, Content Development & News, BCE Inc.]

Madam Chair and honourable committee members, thank you for hearing from us today.

Bell is Canada's largest broadcaster. We operate a variety of broadcasting services across Canada in English and in French.

We support Bill C‑11 and urge its swift passage into law. It is long overdue. The bill begins to level the playing field between us and our foreign competitors, and that is important to the Canadian broadcasting system.

That said, the bill can and must be improved. Bluntly put, it does not properly recognize the central role Canadian broadcasters should have in our own broadcasting system. After all, it is the Broadcasting Act. The discussions to date—including those that occurred as part of Bill C‑10—have dealt with important issues, but have also almost completely ignored what domestic broadcasters require to succeed.

As it stands, Bill C‑11 does not explicitly incentivize foreign content providers to work in partnership with Canadian broadcasters.

This needs to change. Let me explain why.

Historically, Canadian broadcasters have succeeded by running hugely popular U.S. shows that appeal to Canadian audiences and attract significant advertising and subscription revenues. In turn, these revenues are used to fund the creation, production and showcasing of Canadian content.

At Bell Canada alone, we spend $1 billion annually on Canadian productions, both our own and with independent producers. Part of this spend is for local, national and international news that provides uniquely Canadian perspectives on events here and around the world.

Let me be clear. Everything we are able to achieve as Canadian broadcasters is directly related to the profits we make by accessing foreign content. Without it, we simply don't have a business. We have achieved that access through a regulatory regime that enables it.

Go ahead, Jonathan.

[Hélène Messier, President and Chief Executive Officer, Association québécoise de la production médiatique]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you for having me today.

I am Hélène Messier, president and chief executive officer of the Association québécoise de la production médiatique, AQPM.

The AQPM advises, represents and supports more than 160 independent Quebec film, television and web production companies. Members of the AQPM also produce content for online platforms, such as documentaries or web series. Therefore, many of them are also creators of original digital content.

On February 1, 2021, I appeared before the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage to talk about the importance and urgency of passing Bill C‑10. One year later, I am reiterating the same message concerning Bill C‑11.

How do things stand one year later? Canadian domestic production and Quebec production are both declining. Less and less Canadian content is being produced in Canada. In fact, 58% of spending in the Canadian audiovisual sector now comes from companies that are headquartered outside Canada.

Independent production companies now account for 31% of the production volume—that figure was 35% last year—and broadcaster in‑house productions, which are essentially news, public affairs or sports programs, account for 11%.

Some will say it's great that Canada is a land of welcome for foreign businesses, but that leads to a loss of intellectual property for Canadian businesses and job losses for Canadian creators and actors.

Giving up our ability to create, produce, showcase and broadcast our cultural content to benefit foreign interests is like accepting foreign companies exploiting 58% of our agricultural land, according to their own standards, and controlling the marketing of grains, fruits and vegetables, while selling them back to us at a profit. On top of that, we would be thanking them for the jobs they have created. That is what Bill C‑11 remedies by giving the CRTC the tools it needs to support all actors that decide to do business in Canada.

Online broadcasting services occupy a space that is constantly growing in the broadcasting ecosystem. In Quebec, 70% of francophone adults subscribe to at least one on‑demand video service, with Netflix being at the top of the list. In the francophone market, individuals in the 18 to 34 age group consume on‑demand online content more than they do traditional television. In the 18 to 24 age group, people watch YouTube nearly eight hours a week, while TikTok is now one of the most used platforms by the youngest people and has grown by 55% over the past year. The TikTok platform even became an official partner of the Cannes Film Festival this year and created for the event a competition of short films under three minutes in which both experienced and emerging filmmakers participated. This situation was unimaginable only a year ago.

The use of social media to broadcast original and professional audiovisual content to reach audiences that are forsaking traditional media is a phenomenon that will keep growing. So it is essential that Bill C‑11 enable CRTC to include in its area of jurisdiction both subscription-based streaming companies, such as Netflix and illico, and social media companies, such as YouTube, Facebook and TikTok.

It is also important for companies that provide Internet and mobile telephone services to be included in the bill, so that the CRTC may potentially determine how they could contribute to the creation and presentation of Canadian content. Those companies are currently completely excluded from the application of the act. Yet they play an important role in the ecosystem, not only by enabling content broadcasting and distribution, but also by providing privileged access to certain broadcasting platforms. For instance, Telus users get free access to ICI TOU.TV Extra; Vidéotron users have the same privilege, for three months, for Vrai and Club illico; and Bell Media and Rogers offer similar packages for Crave or Disney+.

The AQPM is also proposing certain amendments for the audiovisual industry, which are the result of a collaborative effort with the Coalition for the Diversity of Cultural Expressions or with the Canadian Media Producers Association and the Alliance des producteurs francophones du Canada. I may tell you about this later. Otherwise, I will send you those amendments.

Thank you very much.