Thank you very much to the committee for inviting us. I fully agree with both Ryan and John.
My name is Ahmed Kassem. I have been producing and hosting cultural community television shows for many years in the past decade. In addition, I am the host of a local community radio show that focuses on intercultural relationships in rural communities. All programs are intended to increase awareness and understanding of many cultures and languages in the Brooks area, to indicate to newcomers their rights and responsibilities in Canada, and to increase newcomer knowledge about the community they live in through interviews with key community leaders and service providers.
BIll C-10 is helpful to that if it goes hand-in-hand with the Canadian Broadcasting Act, [Technical difficulty—Editor] broadcasting. At the same time, we should impress the [Inaudible—Editor] digital world. It's more difficult than it used to be for families to come together to watch one TV screen; you can all watch the same thing on different devices. The online world should pass the same scrutiny as the Broadcasting Act, in that the contents should not be produced by someone from their home, which enables individuals and groups to spread misinformation, which can be harmful and sometimes dangerous.
The bill also helps visible minorities be a part of the broadcasting world because the voices of all Canadians matter, not where they come from. It could be said that the bill seeks to even the playing field, so to speak, for content disparities all over Canada. The bill would have them all operate under the same regulatory guidelines.
I believe it is critical to ensure that any legislation does not result in earlier streaming services pulling out of Canada. The proposed heightened guidelines as to what they are required to follow could drive the services out of Canada, therefore narrowing the scope of media and content available in the country.
I am personally in favour of the bill, with the caution that I mentioned before: Having all media providers in Canada under the same guidelines makes it fairer for smaller broadcast hosts to operate. It also safely [Inaudible—Editor] and ensures Canadian content availability in Canada, keeping us close to our roots—while also avoiding promoting harmful content—to ensure the protection and support of local broadcasting and newspapers, especially in our rural communities throughout Canada.
The discussions on this topic raise four main questions for me. One, how exactly will this be protecting Canadian content? Two, how will the content be vetted? Three, where will it come from? Finally, will this create any new employment opportunities for Canada?