Canadian Heritage Committee on Feb. 25th, 2016

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

Bingo. You've said it all right there.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Larry Maguire]

Thank you, Mr. Waugh and Mr. MacKay.

Mr. Nantel, you have a question, and I'll let Mr. O'Regan have another one, and then we'll cut it off.

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

Thank you very much for a bonus question.

Ms. Auer, I saw you react strongly when Mr. Winseck talked about the overarching notion of news and of this need. Would you like to add some comments on this topic?

[Monica Auer]

I think the question came up in the idea of what we can do going forward. I mean, we're here now.

I think if I were a major shareholder in Bell, I'd be really upset at the notion that the commission could come in arbitrarily and say that Bell couldn't have half of those licences. On the other hand, we're in a position, as with other industries, where we fear that we have the “too big to fail” and “too big to be allowed to fail” syndrome, but now we also have the “we're not going to actually do what you say because we don't have to” attitude.

I don't want to sound any more hyperbolistic than my colleague Dwayne; it's just that the commission actually isn't prevented from having competitive licence renewal processes.

Suppose that you're in Ottawa and you thought you could do a better job. Maybe Al would like to start up a new company. Well, he's not going to get a new TV frequency, because they're so limited, but why couldn't he apply to use the frequency currently licensed to CJOH? It's called “competitive renewals”. The CRTC prohibited the idea in 1978. At that time, there were 60 or 70 TV owners. There was ample competition. We're now down to 17 owners. Is that sufficient competition to ensure that Parliament's objectives are met? Rather than arbitrarily taking people's licences away, why not introduce competition in the licensing process?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Larry Maguire]

Thank you for that as well.

Mr. O'Regan.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Auer, I want you to take us back to this pure nostalgia era of the 1970s and 1980s and tell me a bit about what happened there.

Also, you don't necessarily have to answer this question, but this is where I think I'm going with it. Much of what you talked about was particularly about lack of data, the destruction of data, and that sort of thing. Given the fact that it's a quasi-judicial body, do we need to take a look once again at the role of the CRTC and the framework in which it works?

[Monica Auer]

It's easy to look back on the 1980s and say, “Weren't those times wonderful?” Well, they weren't wonderful if you were a private radio broadcaster and you had to complete a detailed analysis of hundreds of program elements. That wasn't good. What was good is that if you look at the decisions from the 1980s, the commission would tell you exactly how much service was being given to the local community. I think that was a very good thing. That has been completely lost.

In terms of re-examining the role of the CRTC, the CRTC Act itself was created in 1975, as I recall. It's very old itself. The CRTC in 1968 was a large commission. There were many part-time members. These days there are very few members, and I think it might be worthwhile looking at whether the CRTC has the appropriate mandate, resources, structure, design, and governance to do its job properly.

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

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Larry Maguire]

Thank you very much.

I see one more arm.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

I was going to move to adjourn.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Larry Maguire]

One moment. That's not a debatable motion. We still have some in camera work to do.

Perhaps I will move that we end this session and thank our guests for being here. We will move in camera. I'd ask everyone else to leave the room. We need a few minutes for an item here.

Thank you very much for your presentations today.

[Monica Auer]

Thank you again for inviting us.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Larry Maguire]

Thank you, Mr. Demers, as well.

[Prof. François Demers]

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Larry Maguire]

We will suspend for a moment.

[Proceedings continue in camera]