Thank you. This is a very interesting discussion this morning.
I am going to begin with a few general comments, because I only have five minutes.
On the issue of accountability in the governance structure, I think you've nailed it. I'm really hoping that our committee will take that seriously as a recommendation. If we're going to improve performance standards, we have to have that level of accountability in the governance structure.
In terms of your points about moving out of local news programming and how to better deal with television, I can look in my region, where CTV does an excellent job of doing the regional news. That's what they do, except on the francophone side, where Radio-Canada is the only voice for television regionally.
On the issue of how we use our television dollars, we're trying to go head to head with the U.S. on drama, the issue of sports, and these are big issues. I find your suggestion about how we look at telling regional stories to the rest of the country very provocative, because I do believe people will listen. The problem that I see--you would know this probably much more than I do--is this. When I was in television, I was working with a production company to basically do that--regional documentaries, our own stories. We wanted to tell the great stories that haven't been told and do it in a fun way. We had some great plans. But it costs a lot of money, and whether you're going up against CBC or private broadcasters, it's a lot easier to put on a cooking show or a talk show, because you just have the camera, you have the light, and there you are. To get out and do good regional programming that can tell the kinds of stories that radio does very well is expensive.
So my question to you is, if we were going to take that step in television, how would we do it, if we're not looking at reliance on advertising revenues?