Concerning local programming, the competition is not fair. Canadians have access to hundreds of TV channels and a broadcasting system that is among the most diversified in the world, but the Canadian television market is one of the most complex, competitive and regulated that exists. Diversity has a price.
The struggle to attract viewers and advertising income has intensified since the early 1990s. Today, there are some 170 specialty Canadian channels competing for the same audiences and advertising. And for local stations, advertising is their only source of income. Canadians also receive, via cable, dozens of American channels in all kinds of niches.
Here's the problem. Canadian specialty and U.S. cable channels receive hundreds of millions of dollars in subscriber fees each year. In fact, over the last nine years, U.S. cable channels--I'm saying U.S.--such as CNN, A&E, and Spike TV received almost $2 billion from Canadian cable and satellite services. Meanwhile, local television received nothing.
The time to act is now. Fee-for-carriage is a basic question of fairness, recognized as far back as 1971 when the CRTC established the first cable policy. The commission declared at the time that one should pay for what one uses to operate one's business. In other words, fee-for-carriage was regarded as a matter of fair business practice and was one of several measures prescribed by the CRTC at the time to counterbalance the impact of cable technology and the importation of additional foreign signals into the local marketplace, but it was never implemented, as you know.
So today, while new entrants such as specialty and foreign cable channels receive a portion of cable and satellite bills, local stations still don't receive a cent. Ironically, Canadians believe that a portion of their cable or satellite bills is going to their local stations. In two separate consumer surveys conducted on our behalf since 2006, subscribers overwhelmingly said they valued local television above all other programming services. More than 65% of subscribers also believed they were already paying for local stations on their bills. When informed that local stations don't receive any portion of their fees, almost 80% of subscribers were in favour of local stations receiving a portion of their basic fees, and a vast majority of respondents were willing to pay almost $5 extra each month to continue to receive their local station.
The cable and satellite companies continue to argue that consumers will revolt if their bills increase, and we know this is your concern also. During last year's CRTC policy review, executives at Rogers and Shaw threatened to pass on to consumers any new carriage fees for local stations. Rogers executives actually said the majority of Canadian consumers are not prepared to pay a fee where no added value is associated with that fee. Consumers would be forced to pay an extra $5 or $10 a month on their cable or satellite bill and receive nothing new for this increase. But based on the 50¢-per-subscriber fee that we proposed, the average increase would have been no more than $2.40 in most markets and much lower than that in many places.
But here's the irony. In March of this year, Rogers subscribers saw their bill increase by $6 a month, although Rogers had not added a single additional service, and no revolt occurred. In fact, by all accounts, despite continuous price increases over the years, the number of cable and satellite subscribers has continued to grow. The facts just don't support their arguments.