This change in strategy for Radio 2 has actually been the subject of studies and consultations that date back three years.
I have to tell you, I'm relatively new to radio. I became in charge of radio at the end of November last year, but I followed this--when I was in charge of television--and then looked into it in considerable detail when they asked me to worry about radio as well.
I have to tell you, I think this was certainly the most far-reaching consultation that I've ever seen in terms of a shift in CBC strategy.
I will just say a couple of other things. One is having access to classical music. As the president said, it will continue to be on Radio 2, but as he mentioned earlier on, the other thing we're going to do is we're going to put up a full classical music channel. It will be on the Internet. It won't be on the airwaves.
Now it's interesting that if you look at the consumption statistics for radio in North America, approximately 11% to 12% of all consumption of radio is now online, and that obviously skews very heavily by age. So if you were to look at a younger demographic, they're going to consume way more of that stuff online than an older demographic, and that is increasingly the case.
But I would say one other thing: one of the facts that made an enormous impression on me was that in Canada we release about 30,000 pieces of music a year, and of those 30,000 pieces of music, only 240 get commercial airplay. So there is a kind of vast musical landscape that you really can't hear. You just can't hear it. It's not made available, and that seems a shame.
So this shift in strategy is not meant in any way to denigrate classical music. Everybody understands the centrality and importance of classical music to the musical tradition in Canada. It's rather to open up for Canadians all the rest of the music to which they have so little access.