Evidence of meeting #32 for Canadian Heritage in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cbc.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Pierre Breton Liberal Shefford, QC
Madam Chair, I'm going to begin.
During the meeting, we spoke briefly about the job reductions that were, I believe, announced in 2014, as part of Strategy 2020. Since then, our government has announced investments.
I am particularly interested in successorship—in the young people who are studying in colleges and universities and who, of course, are interested in the communications field. Earlier, Mr. O'Regan noted that his first job was with the CBC. Many young people are looking for their first jobs in this field, and the CBC remains a very interesting employer in this regard. There are brilliant, interesting young people with extraordinary talents who could help CBC/Radio-Canada make the shift that's under way.
What's your situation with respect to possible hires over the coming years?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
Mr. Breton, when we announced this plan, we immediately spoke of the importance we ascribe to good technical and content delivery skills. Young journalists have those skills, and we want them on board.
Some 300 positions will be created as part of the 2020 plan. Roughly 150 people have already been hired. We continue to seek new talent on an ongoing basis. At CBC/Radio-Canada, roughly 1,200 or 1,300 people have completed retraining programs for the digital environment. Another 630 people who have management skills will enable us to manage our shift. We are very conscious of this.
Mr. Lalande can probably speak to you about one of our initiatives involving four young indigenous journalists we've just hired. This will give you a window into what we can do these days.
Executive Vice-President, French Services, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
I will tell you about it another way.
At Radio-Canada—and I think it's the same thing at the CBC—the reinvestment is enabling us to become attractive to young people again. That's something I've felt throughout the country. Young people are interested in contributing to CBC/Radio-Canada, on the radio, on TV, on digital platforms, and in every form of expression. It's very encouraging.
To follow on Mr. Lacroix's remarks, we've launched a project for indigenous Canadians. At Radio-Canada, for the first time, four indigenous interns will be joining four regional station teams for a year. This will enable them to contribute to the economy, because the internships are paid.
An extremely stimulating movement has been launched. If you listen to the radio, you'll hear these new, young journalist voices throughout Canada. The movement is very much under way. We'll be able to continue offering young people such opportunities.
Liberal
Dan Vandal Liberal Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB
I'd like to come back to what's happening in Saint-Boniface.
Radio-Canada is doing an excellent job reflecting our reality, whether it's covering festivals, the Théâtre du Cercle Molière, or local elections. But four hours of local programming each week have been cut.
What assurance can you give Saint-Boniface residents that their radio will be there for them in the future, and that their voice will be heard?
Executive Vice-President, French Services, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
I can simply assure you that radio, TV and digital services in Manitoba and Western Canada will continue to improve.
We were talking about news. In the coming months, we'll be rolling out all our initiatives aimed at ensuring that our programming better reflects the full range of social and cultural interests. I'm not just talking about news programming. We will be even more present at music festivals that encourage the emergence of new talent, and we will offer these young people a springboard.
I can guarantee you that you'll see this dynamic at work. Its presence will be bigger than ever.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Thank you, Mr. Lalande. Thank you, Mr. Vandal, for being so crisp.
Mr. Nantel, go ahead.
NDP
Pierre Nantel NDP Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
There is no doubt that, as our public broadcaster, the CBC must be the champion of new practices, a new framework, and a new telecommunications universe in Canada. I fully support that mission. We also expect a great deal of transparency, because the CBC is the broadcaster of Canadians, and Canadian taxpayers.
To answer my colleague's question, all the selection criteria for the board of directions are posted on the site, but those pertaining to current members have been redacted to avoid showing too much about whether or not they have the requisite skills. Two empty columns correspond to two vacant positions. The site also contains Mr. Lacroix's work report, but it's redacted on the basis that it's a trade secret. Naturally, the choices you make on behalf of all Canadians must be strategic, but they must not be too accessible, because you'd want to avoid the same document being used for the CEO of Global or CTV.
On the other hand, it's unfortunate that this transparency is absent, and this discussion we should be having with the minister as part of the consultations might not take place. The big players—Bell, Rogers and the others—have said what they had to say without whipping themselves, or putting themselves through the grinder. It's too bad, because we really need to speak face to face.
Ms. Conway, you mentioned that you're doing some productions with Netflix. We'd like to know how that works, whether you would licence Netflix to use the programming outside Canada, and whether these productions will be available in Canada after you've aired them live here. I focus particularly on children's television programming.
NDP
Pierre Nantel NDP Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC
My constant concern these days is the Netflix Kids portal. It's hell. We're not there yet in Canada. Ms. Conway, do you think there's a way to prioritize children's television co-productions with Netflix?
Executive Vice-President, English Services, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
The challenge with children's programming, as you know, is that there are so many channels dedicated to cartoons: Teletoon, Disney—
NDP
Pierre Nantel NDP Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC
Hasn't Netflix become a major competitor, with 5 to 10 million subscribers?
Executive Vice-President, English Services, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
I'm just talking about commissioning and developing. We don't produce most of our content in-house any more, so most of it is commissioned from independents. Some of our children's is, and some of our interstitial children's is.
We would absolutely be open to partnering with Netflix. We are open to partnering with lots of different folks to create great content. We do have a very specific focus in our children's programming on the under-six crowd. We don't generally go for the stuff that's competing with Teletoon and those kinds of—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Thank you, Mrs. Conway.
I want to thank the CBC for coming. It was a long session. You sat there for two hours and answered questions, which is good. It's really what we wanted from you.
I have a couple of questions as the chair. I usually don't ask questions, but I really do want to ask this.
Coming up to Canada 150, CBC has a huge amount of archival content, shows that you have done over the period of time between 1952 and 1992. Is it possible for you to put that treasure chest of archival content out there online, so that Canadians can see it and remember the journey?
I can give you one example. It's a west coast production, The Beachcombers, and Molly's Reach. There are lots of things you have in your archival content, and it could benefit Canadians to go back and look at them. Do you have any plans for doing that? That's the first question.
The second question is about diversity. We heard a question about diversity. You have Kim's Convenience and Little Mosque on the Prairie. You have gone into diversity, but I think there is room to do that more. There is room to look at the diverse LGBTQ populations and tell stories about them. I wonder whether you have a plan to become a little more diverse in terms of representing Canadians.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
Heather, do you want to go with the archival material? Then I'll ask Louis to answer that question, too, and then we'll go back to diversity.
Executive Vice-President, English Services, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
Sure.
For the archival material, unfortunately the answer is “it depends”. We don't own the rights to all of the archival material. We generally secure rights, if it's funded by CMF, for six or seven years, and then that's all the rights we have. For a show like Kids in the Hall, we would have to buy the rights to air that or show that to people on our digital platforms, and so it depends.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
The National Film Board does this, though. Is it possible for you to get that negotiation going with independents, because it's great Canadian content?
Executive Vice-President, English Services, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
We do that when we feel that it will find an audience. We do that. We have re-issued Kids in the Hall on our comedy portal, for example.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
Louis, would you comment?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
It's archives first.
Executive Vice-President, French Services, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
It's archives.
The archives are extremely important. As Ms. Conway mentioned, there's a large proportion of programs to which we don't own the rights. Therefore, when we want to rebroadcast or reuse them, we need to pay royalties.
Many shows belong to us too. For drama and variety, there's everything before 1985. From then onward, there are all the documentaries, and there's the entire news category.
All I can tell you is that we have an expedited plan in this regard. The first phase is to ensure the full archive is digitized. The second, which we have always had on radio on TV and in prime time, is programming that draws on archives. The TV program Les enfants de la télé and the radio program Aujourd'hui l'histoire are examples. This enables us to use archived materials and help audiences re-experience major moments in history from a modern perspective.
All of this will accelerate, but it's true that rights are a challenge for the major productions. We'll probably get there one day.