Canadian Heritage Committee on March 8th, 2016

[Jeanne d'Arc Umurungi]

There is no one. A teacher from Saskatchewan wrote that. He even started a petition because of this situation. Nearly 690 people signed the petition at the time. In fact, CBC/Radio-Canada still had someone there, but that position was just recently cut. We realized that no one from the private sector had ever been assigned to this work and that the only person who covered the news was a CBC/Radio-Canada reporter, whose position had been eliminated.

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

One position, meaning 100%.

Ms. Smyth, would you like to say anything else on the subject?

[Carmel Smyth]

Can I add to that? Regina is not that small a city. Let's be honest. As I look around, you are all from different provinces with cities of varying sizes often significantly smaller than Regina. If that's happening in Regina it's going to happen where you're from. It's going to happen in hundreds of Canadian cities that are smaller than Regina. It's happening everywhere. I'd like to make a plug that the solution is not moving everything online because it's cheaper. This idea that we can have news online—

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

But content is content.

[Carmel Smyth]

—and it won't cost as much as television, let's go there; but that's not really the problem. There's incredible information online. But if you don't like what the press writes about you now, how are you going to like it when they're getting that information from bloggers, for example, or from your neighbour next door, or from the guy up the street who saw you leaving the house doing whatever? That's what it is online. It's absolutely unfiltered.

The issue is that you have to have professional journalists who are accountable, who have integrity, who have training to provide news that you can trust. That's the issue, and that has a cost.

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

Of course.

[Carmel Smyth]

It doesn't matter if you're watching it on television. People will say that no one's watching television, but that's not the point. You have to pay to have quality news that you can trust and rely on.

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

Up until now, advertising has paid for that.

[Carmel Smyth]

That's right.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Your seven minutes are up, Monsieur Nantel.

Monsieur Breton and Ms. Dabrusin for the Liberals will be sharing their time. They will have three and a half minutes each.

Monsieur Breton.

[Pierre Breton, Liberal, Shefford, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I am truly pleased with the presentations made today.

I will be quick because I only have three and a half minutes.

Ms. Umurungi, you mentioned earlier that we will have 15,000 fewer journalists by 2020. This is a rather striking and major announcement.

[Jeanne d'Arc Umurungi]

To be accurate, that is 15,000 workers in Canada. Specifically, that means 7,000 media workers and 15,000 workers if we include all connected industries and other jobs.

[Pierre Breton, Liberal, Shefford, QC]

Very well. In my view, that is major.

The digital space continues to grow. Obviously, we cannot do anything about that for the time being. There is a lot of practical information available on the various social media platforms, but you, the media workers, are the ones who produce the news. You cover events.

In my region, our local media venues are important. They have deep roots in our community. They are community partners. Who will produce our news in the future? Who will cover our events? Who will make sure these regional communities do not become isolated? I am simply asking the question.

[Jeanne d'Arc Umurungi]

Those are very important questions. That is what worries us as well, and that is why we are discussing it. That is why we went before the CRTC to talk about the public service media fund that our president mentioned earlier.

For us, that fund would be financed by 1% of the profits of cable and satellite companies. We went before the CRTC recently to talk about television, but we also said that this must apply to all platforms. For us, that is very important. We also said that the money would not come just from cable companies. Indeed, the large companies that provide Internet services are among those raking in enormous profits from all these changes that we are talking about and that affect us—changes that are of benefit to us too, to some extent.

At this time, they cannot contribute to such funds because they are not supposed to be content distributors. However, in actual fact, they are. I hope that you will have the opportunity to look at the revenue growth curve in this area. You will see what part is super-profitable right now. When I watch videos on my phone or at home, or especially when my daughter does, that is Rogers. That is where revenues are growing and these companies are not contributing.

It is true that the legislation does not allow it at this time, but someone will have to see how these people can contribute, because that was how we were able to finance Canadian content and the production of news and other things in Canada at a time when those companies were not there yet. They are there now and they are benefiting. There should be a way to make them participate in our broadcasting system.

[Pierre Breton, Liberal, Shefford, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Ms. Dabrusin.

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

Thank you.

Ms. Smyth, I want to thank you for flagging International Women's Day. My first question is for you.

When we're looking at media consolidation and the changes that are happening in the media industry, do you have information on any changes in the number of women in leadership positions or in the number of women working as journalists or in the media industry?

[Carmel Smyth]

Sure. That's a very good question, and there's some very positive...and I guess maybe not as much progress. You won't be surprised.

In a general newsroom—I'll give the CBC as an example because I worked there for many years and because, as a crown corporation, it tracks gender parity amongst its staff—it's 50%, 53% or 47%. On the main floor there is equality. Because we have a union that is very strong, there's equality of pay, and it's something we monitor. That's at CBC.

In the private companies, it isn't tracked as strictly, I don't believe, but I also think it's pretty much equal, because in any newsroom—Seamus could talk about it—there's pretty much an equal male to female ratio, right?

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

Yes.

[Carmel Smyth]

It's a job where it doesn't matter. Gender isn't an issue. But I will say—and maybe, Seamus, you could weigh in—at the very senior levels it's still overwhelmingly male. Once you get to the VPs, the directors, the presidents, and the money people at the top, it's still unusual to find women.

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

If I could just add briefly, Wendy Freeman is the president of CTV News, and has been for quite some time. She is a very able president, I may add. But, yes, I think overall in the broadcast industry, just stepping outside of news, but looking overall at the people who make the decisions, I think it's still—

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

I'm sorry, Ms. Dabrusin, you're down to just one and a half minutes.

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

Thank you.

Just as far as trends go, though, when we're talking about media consolidation changes, have there been any changes that have been happening or is it pretty much static?

[Carmel Smyth]

No, it's worse. Many years ago, maybe in the 2008 heritage committee, concentration of media was flagged as a problem. It's a huge problem. Do you want just one person's opinion in the newspapers in a whole province? I mean, there is something to be said for having a more left, a central, and a right version when you have many players who influence opinion. In the end, having one view—and that's where we're heading—means that it's the opinion that you'll have in that province. It's scary. It's just not right.

[Jeanne d'Arc Umurungi]

If I may just add, concentration of media most of the time happened where I think there was always an idea that there would be public interest served, and what we've seen is that we're just losing. They're cutting, losing jobs, losing programming, and losing obviously all kinds of outlets. It hasn't really served that part of the bargain well, and I think that has to be reviewed.