Canadian Heritage Committee on May 10th, 2016

[Dr. Mohammad Tajdolati]

I think a fund could help.

Publications must be able to respond to the criteria that the government defines.

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

I am going to talk to you as a beginner because I know nothing about these matters and I am not a newspaper publisher.

Your papers represent a mosaic of cultures and are meant for very compartmentalized client groups. It also makes good sense for each community to be served by its media in a distinct way. Is there a platform that you could use as a basic model and tailor it however you like?

As is so often said, it is 2016. Transactional websites, for television, for example, let anyone set up a PayPal account in a few minutes. Could the government help you to make that digital shift? Would that allow you to attract more advertisers? Private sector money makes the world go around, as we know.

[Dr. Mohammad Tajdolati]

Of course.

The members of our organization need training workshops to learn about what the digital revolution means in our day and age. At the same time, they have to be encouraged to look for new advertising revenue. Newspapers could offer their clients an advertisement on their website as well as one in the printed newspaper. This would bring the two currents together and it would be easier to reach the clients.

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

And eventually to extend to your younger clientele. I imagine that is something you are hoping for.

[Dr. Mohammad Tajdolati]

Of course.

[Thomas Saras]

In a digital world, we see daily changes coming to our society. The electronic media nowadays is part of our lives. We cannot as a country go backward to the last century. We have to follow and we have to go. For the first time, as far as I know, Canadian Heritage has come out and said that they encourage us to go digital. We received that letter from them. Last night, we had our monthly meeting in Toronto, and already we have encouraged all the members, about 68 of them who were attending the meeting, to apply for that.

Now, the thing is that they have only a fund of $5,000 per member in order to create a website, which is very little, but we cannot interfere and say anything. The only thing I can assure you of is that the ethnic press is following the trends. We are following day by day how things are developing, and we are doing our best, but we should be seen with sympathy by the government, and we should also accept support.

Some of you know the organizations very well, have attended our affairs, and have seen how we work and how we do things. We are working for Canada. Our constitution states clearly that we are fighting for a united Canada.

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Saras, thank you. I really appreciate that.

Mr. Grewal and Mr. Kailey, thank you. I have to ask you a question. You spoke of the fact that some IP television services come in and steal your advertising market. Are your members aware of that? Are they angry about it?

[Thomas Saras]

Yes. I believe that in the field of television, there should be some changes. For example, they accept and run the various programs from the various countries, and they sell them to Canadians, and what do they do? In a 24-hour program, they don't say even a word about Canada.

Now, just one second here, the question is that this is a Canadian property, the property of the Canadian people. You give it to someone to make money, but you don't give anything back to him, because, for whatever reason, exactly as in the newspapers, he prefers to have the news in his mother tongue.

This is an abuse of the system, and it is very important that the government take care of this matter. Otherwise, we are going to have Mr. Putin bringing his message to Canada as being whatever—an angel—and the Canadian government itself is unable to communicate a message to Canadians. This is very important, and this is a matter for the CRTC. First of all—

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Mr. Saras, I think you're going to have to wind that up. I'm sorry.

I'm moving on to Mr. O'Regan, but I want to say that I don't think we're going to have time for a second round on this one.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

I wanted to explore a little more your approach to digital media. As you said, Mr. Saras, it appears to be something that's inevitable. Could you maybe tell us a little more about how much demand you're receiving from it from your readership?

[Thomas Saras]

I'll tell you. We have a website. Our website receives about 80,000 visits per week, which is about a quarter of a million visits per month. For a community newspaper, this is a very big number. The other thing is, whatever we put on our website can be seen and can be read in Japan, or in China, or in Saudi Arabia—all over the world. The newspaper, the hard copy, is not going as far, and therefore the message will stay in Canada, but whatever I write on the website about Canada is going to be seen everywhere, in every part of the world.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

What about revenue?

[Thomas Saras]

Unfortunately, we don't have revenue. The way the system is right now, the revenue goes to the big guys who are controlling the system, but if the CRTC imposes some rules then probably they're going to protect the little guy. We pay right now. We don't receive.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

What do your traditional print advertisers say to you about digital?

[Thomas Saras]

To be honest with you, when someone gives you $200 to advertise in print, then you put his advertisement also on the website in order to make your service more attractive.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

It's added on to your print contract as an enticement, but there's no extra revenue coming from it?

[Thomas Saras]

No, unfortunately.

It's entirely different with the Toronto Star. The Toronto Star is going to put some articles on the website, but again, they are organized. I cannot organize 50 persons to run around and see how we are going to do. This is the production of one man, and you have to do it the way you have to do it, unfortunately.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

When you look down the road, both for your individual enterprise and for the industry as a whole that you occupy, what do you see? What's the future?

[Thomas Saras]

We try to survive, sir.

Not one of us is making money. This should be understood by the government, by the authorities, and by the ministry. It's not that we are working endless hours. It's not that we are putting in money every day. It's the fact that at the moment one publication closes, this community is going to feel hatred toward the total Canadian community, because they will think that they are down, that they are left down.

When we created multiculturalism, you were very young—

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Bless you.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Thomas Saras]

—but the person who created multiculturalism, I had the honour to know him personally. He thought of a Canada with a perception that everyone was feeling at home. The ethnic press is part of this perception, either with the digital or with the hard copy.

This is something that we have to study and we have to think about. We have to decide how to do it. Look at how many radio channels and TV channels there are. Can you tell me how many of those channels are in the hands of members of the ethnic media and the ethnic press? Two or three, probably. In Toronto, as far as I know, there is CHIN Radio, with Lombardi, who is a third-generation Canadian, but he continues, and there is a Portuguese guy, who is a first-generation Canadian.

The rest are all controlled by the mainstream media. If you go and ask them to give you half an hour, they will ask you for $600 for that time. You cannot get from the small market that you are serving $600 per hour, so automatically the system is going to collapse.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

So in your mind, the mainstream media is too concentrated and asking for too much to reflect the ethnic communities in this country.

[Thomas Saras]

Yes, unfortunately.

I'll bring it to your attention that two years ago Rogers fired 380 people over a six-month period. All of them were members of the ethnic media, because he said that he had been licensed to serve the ethnic communities. I remember that with Iannuzzi, who received the licence for the first channel for multilingual media. That was in 1985. Mr. Mulroney was the one who gave this licence to Iannuzzi.

That was sold to Rogers because Iannuzzi could not continue the operation. He went bankrupt, and Rogers took it for nothing. Then Rogers.... Suppose the mandate of this licence was to serve the ethnic communities. He put on 28 or 30 different linguistic programs. Two years ago, they found that if they cut those programs and introduced sports, they were going to get more money than they would by serving the ethnic communities, and they did so. We went to the CRTC, we complained, we sent letters, and they did absolutely nothing.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Mr. Saras.