Canadian Heritage Committee on May 25th, 2007

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mesdames, first I want to congratulate you for shedding an entirely new light in this committee. I am the only woman member of the committee who has toured Canada, apart from Ms. Keeper, of course, who was not often here with us during the meetings held off Parliament Hill. You have shown us an aspect that no one had thought of. This is really a new element.

I was watching my colleagues while you spoke to us, Ms. Lepage, and I wondered how they were going to react when you said that women, who represent 51% of the population, may not be commensurately visible on television with regard to the handing on of values. I'm not sure. And it's even worse when we go to western Canada. We know perfectly well that here in Quebec, women, the women's movement, has been the leader, has opened a lot of doors.

[Marquise Lepage]

I don't know what the situation is in the west because we obviously don't have the resources to get figures for Canada as a whole.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

It's worse in the west. I find it extremely important that you have informed us this morning about what is going on in Radio-Canada television because we know about Canada's duality. That duality is also felt in the area of values. However, we are increasingly headed toward the right, and Canadian women are losing what they have acquired in the past 30 years. It is urgent that women be there to make documentaries for us, to reflect us, to give us a vision of what you are experiencing, of what we are experiencing as women with our children, our everyday burdens, and so that we can tell the rest of Canada that enough is enough: we need different services.

That said, we aren't here for political reasons, but I nevertheless want to send that message. Bravo! Congratulations! And know that that hasn't fallen on deaf ears. I'll try to come back to it.

My question is for Ms. Simard in particular.

You talked about Radio-Canada, saying that it had to be a strong broadcaster that must continue to do more. Ultimately, you were virtually talking about excellence as well. I'd like to know what that implies in concrete terms, in three or four lines. What, in your view, is a strong broadcaster?

[Monique Simard]

In my view, it's a broadcaster that has the means, the resources to carry out a mandate that must be clear. That's important. I think that that mandate must also clearly state a certain number of things. That's the responsibility of the body that feeds it, that is the government. But it's a broadcaster that also has to have room to manoeuvre. It isn't a government television network. We understand that: it's a public television network. That broadcaster must therefore be independent in its programming and have the resources to be bold. There is the production of information, but there is also so-called artistic, cultural production. It must be bold because excellence can also be seen in boldness, the ability to be avant-garde, to do things that others will not do because it is too risky, not conventional enough or not commercially profitable enough in the short term.

If you recall the things that have been the most striking and distinctive in the production of CBC and Radio-Canada, including in the information genre, you see that we had the means to enable creators, designers and programmers to have imagination, to innovate in various areas. That's what I mean when I talk about a strong broadcaster. Strong means having the means not only to represent everything I've said, but also to be able to do it in an entertaining and seductive form. For me, that is a strong broadcaster.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mesdames, I'll close on this note. Either of you may answer me. When we talk about a strong broadcaster, when we talk about passing on female values—I don't dare say feminist because that word scares people—can we talk about governance?

[Monique Simard]

Do you mean the governance of Radio-Canada?

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Of Radio-Canada.

[Monique Simard]

Radio-Canada is currently directed by a board of directors that you appoint, is it not?

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

We are supposed to.

[Monique Simard]

It is a board appointed by the government or, in any case, by the minister. That board of directors does not assume the day-to-day management of the Crown corporation, but it ensures that its mandate is carried out. That is the role of governance. It is a board of directors that must ensure that the mandate is presented, and regularly and carefully verify that that mandate is carried out, and make occasional reminders when it is not. I don't think that the governance structure is necessarily a problem in itself. It is the way that governance is exercised that may at times be debatable. I'm not saying it is particularly debatable; I'm talking about governance in general. It is nevertheless important to keep a certain distance and to allow those who have to do radio, television or new media the room to do it, always in a manner consistent with the mandates.

[Marquise Lepage]

That's why I think it's important that the mandates be clear and that we be able to change them as necessary. They are generally followed. I cited the example of 1991, when we put it in the act that private producers had to be more involved in Radio-Canada television. There was literally an explosion of new production companies, which resulted in a high level of vitality in the industry. So those rules are followed. Perhaps they should be changed more regularly, verified and quantified to see whether that worked well. No one can deny that it has worked extremely well in the private production sector. If content rules are established, they must be made very clear and their application verified. There are screenwriters. Does that count? Yes, it counts, but they are also needed for direction. That's not very well known.

Moreover, on the list, we're called producers. We are directors. That's different. Monique is a producer, but we are directors. We make artistic choices in the same way as screenwriters do. We do the creation. Production is a creative thing. Producers—Monique is one of my producers, and I can't say anything bad about her, because she's great—do a very good job and are creative in part. No one will say that Denys Arcand's films are women's films, even though they were produced by a woman. When you think of similar things, you have to say that directors have to have an important place at Radio-Canada and throughout the corporation. That's where the reality of women is conveyed, whether it be a mother's reality or that of anyone else. Radio-Canada has to put more women on the screen.

In the United States, the surveys have started to change. Americans may have started to accept the idea of having a woman president when a very popular actress played the role of president of the United States in a television series. So you see how important television is. Fiction and documentaries enter people's living rooms. I have previously heard children ask why boys were better than girls. That's because, on television, it's one thing or another. Television is starting to tell my daughter that. It's not what is specifically being said, but, after a while, that winds up being the reality. There are only presidents, prime ministers and we say to ourselves that that's reality. That's not what we want. I'm sure that everyone shares our values on gender equality, but television doesn't represent those values.

[Lucette Lupien, Consultant - film and television, Réalisatrices équitables]

I would like to add one brief comment. SODEC invests 14% of its funds in women's films, and Telefilm 11%, in large part because audiovisual production in Quebec and Canada is triggered by television. Radio-Canada, which controls 37% of the Canadian Television Fund's budget, can make major changes. It can ask SODEC and Telefilm Canada to change their rules. If the CBC/Radio-Canada changes its requests to the production companies, there will be changes throughout the audiovisual production chain.

[Monique Simard]

We could set a rule that 50% of the boards of directors of Crown corporations must consist of women. Men and women are now equally represented in cabinets in France and Quebec. It's even easier to reach parity when you can appoint people to a board of directors. A right step would be taken by requiring that women make up 50% of the CBC/Radio-Canada's board of directors.

[An hon. member]

But that would not be enough.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

I know we could go on forever, but we have gone a little bit over. So if everyone is going to have an opportunity to ask a question, we have to stay within the time. We only have 15 minutes left.

Mr. Angus.

I'm switching the roles around here a little bit.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you for your presentation.

I find this discussion fascinating. In fact, I'm going to diverge from my normal course. I usually leave philosophical thoughts to my good friend Mr. Kotto, and I usually just ask precise, technical questions. But I feel this morning I need to adopt some of his grand vision.

We're talking about the role of a public broadcaster in a fragmented media universe. The argument has been laid out that in a world of massive fragmentation...and clearly there's less fragmentation in the Quebec market, for specific reasons, than we've seen in the English market. But what role is there, what need is there for the voice of a public broadcaster when we have a thousand channels? When we had Mr. von Finckenstein here, he referred to all the other voices out there. We have ten million blog sites. Where we used to have reporters and documentary producers, now we have ten million opinions.

I'm fascinated by this discussion, because it seems that more than ever there's a need for coherent, engaged, intelligent--not intellectual, but intelligent--discourse. What we see in a thousand-channel universe.... I'm not disrespecting the specialty channels, but I watched television last night, and there was a program on teaching yuppies to put their plumbing together for an hour and a half. The other night we saw the reality TV show about a tattoo parlour that went on for about two hours. Where are we as Canadians in this?

So my question is twofold.

Number one, is there not a greater case now, in a multi-channel universe, for a coherent public broadcaster than even before?

Secondly, we are now on the verge of a major upheaval in terms of the BitTorrent capacities of people to download whatever they want, whenever they want. At a time when we as a nation should be ramping up to meet, I don't believe the challenge, but the opportunity to get our product into the international realm on the Internet, actually instead of ramping up as a national broadcaster and as a nation, we seem to be in retreat. We're talking about further deregulation. We're talking about letting whoever do whatever, and we're going to sit behind this little blanket on the beach and wait for the great tsunami to wash over us in terms of what's coming down in the digital realm.

What role do we have to have in utilizing our resources to meet a 21st century challenge in terms of the media, not just in a thousand-channel universe, but across the web?

[Monique Simard]

In response to your two questions, I can't say anything other than what you just said, because that's precisely my first point. The fourth point of my presentation is that, now more than ever, in this fragmented era, we need it. In fact, the unimaginable constellation of channels, Web sites, blogs and so on won't necessarily give you a whole picture. Everyone will look for it a bit in what I call the specialized ignorances: people focus on small fields. They don't expose themselves to more.

We are obviously living in a free country where we are all free to go and look at what we want, but we nevertheless live in a society. We are still a country, a complex, changing society. What kind of tool does that society create in order to be cohesive? What kind of tool does that society acquire in order to try to share a certain number of values and criteria, including representativeness, obviously. I talked about cultural diversity, but there is also gender representation: male, female and other.

Otherwise, why are we here, around this table today? I think that new technologies and new broadcasting platforms are, on the contrary, extraordinary tools for expansion and visibility that must be used. There may be a little marking time, but we have nevertheless done a fairly good job in using them to date. The CBC/Radio-Canada must be encouraged to move more toward that side. That's central to the debate.

Personally—if I may be a little philosophical, as you are—I think that the problems we are currently experiencing on the planet are partly attributable to the fact that we confine ourselves to closed, specialized worlds, in closed groups. So other people's understanding of reality escapes us. We don't have the means to understand or see that. So, in a way, we have to force a break-up.

[Marquise Lepage]

In Greece, one year after the state television network was privatized, 82% of programs broadcast on television were foreign. When we talk about tools for cohesion, CBC/Radio-Canada television may be a tool for cohesion where there are rules. More than ever, as you said, Mr. Angus, we need a strong, well-funded state television, where we can see ourselves, not the country next door, which is very nice, but... We have to see ourselves, see our values and what we want to be.

[Monique Simard]

Brazil is an example. Brazil is an enormous country with nearly 200 million inhabitants, a country where economic inequalities are terrible, but a country where there is also a lot of money. Brazil has never had public television. However, it is now studying the possibility, indeed the necessity of establishing a public television network. That shows you the extent to which not only will the twenty-first century not mark the end of public television, but, in certain cases, where there has never been any, we sense the need to create such a network, for reasons I have stated here.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Ms. Lupien.

[Lucette Lupien]

I would like to add that Dominique Volton, who is a French researcher, has previously said that public television is a great place for democracy. After elections are held every four years, it is the place where people gather and it also provides, of course, an image, which, at the same time, has an objective of an image of a country to propose.

I would add that, if you look at the CBC/Radio-Canada in particular, the use it makes of the Internet is one way to guide us through this universe, where there are indeed 100,000 sites on any subject. So when we look at a program on Radio-Canada and then go on the Internet, we are guided to various sites or various types of information that can assist our thinking. In that sense, no other channel is doing that job.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Thank you.

Mr. Scarpaleggia.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Earlier we heard from groups—perhaps you weren't in the room—who told us that a program produced by independent producers cost approximately 25% more. What is your reaction to that statement? Perhaps we could start with that question. Do you believe we should produce more in house? We're talking about Radio-Canada. You are producers and independent producers. So I imagine you are more of the view that Radio-Canada should produce more programs or, at least, as many as it has currently has produced.

[Marquise Lepage]

I think we should have increasing numbers of women's films produced because, 10 years ago, statistics showed that women's films cost 20% less than men's films. So that would ultimately be fair.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

No. I'm not asking the question from the standpoint of gender equality.