Thank you, Chair and committee members, for allowing me to speak today.
My name is Scott Benzie. I am the lead coffee-getter of a new organization called Digital First Canada. Our main goal is to ensure that artists who choose digital platforms as a distribution model are heard and included in important discussions like these.
I would like to say at the outset that I certainly don't speak for all digital creators, as they are a far too diverse collection of Canadian storytellers, but I'm happy to lend my insight where it's valuable. I know that the topic of this meeting is the Status of the Artist Act. I promise to do my best to limit my statement to that act.
I would like you all to ask yourselves one question when considering the act: Are digital first creators artists, and are they covered under the act? If you come to the answer that, yes, they are, there are a few places in the act that I would like to address.
The proclamation states:
(b) the importance to Canadian society of conferring on artists a status that reflects their primary role in developing and enhancing Canada’s artistic and cultural life, and in sustaining Canada’s quality of life;
(c) the role of the artist, in particular to express the diverse nature of the Canadian way of life and the individual and collective aspirations of Canadians;
I think we would all agree that those are admirable. I hope the government would in no way pass legislation that would violate that proclamation and decide which artists are more valuable.
If you believe digital creators are covered under the artists act, I ask you this: Are they also eligible for tax incentives, tax credits, averaged salary declaration, access to EI and other programs that we're discussing here, or do they have to be a member of an approved union, lobby group or association to have their artistry validated?
There are more digital creators in Canada than any membership of any organizations we hear from all the time in these meetings, but today, nothing in the act covers the rights of the digital creator—rights that should be protected with their platform partners, and, more importantly, the right to not have the government intervene and decide what types of content should be discovered and what should not. The act discusses at length the rights of artists when negotiating with producers, but makes no mention of the rights of artists who are their own producers, who own their own content and who should have the ability to compete equally globally, on global platforms.
If you believe digital first creators are covered under the act, I invite you all to have some conversations with us before making decisions that affect us.
Now, in turn, maybe you think digital first creators are not artists covered by the act. That's okay. Maybe you think digital creators are influencers, and cat videos, and young kids in their parents' bedroom. I assure you that they are not. They are filmmakers, documentarians, musicians, dancers, comedians and the modern variety show. But they do not need your validation. If you believe digital first creators should not be covered by the act, you would agree that we shouldn't be writing legislation that would punish them under the cover of an act that doesn't include them.
Let me tell you what would be at risk. Canada is number one on the planet in percentage of content that is exported around the world on YouTube. I'm going to say it again: They are number one on the planet's second-largest search engine—English and French, indigenous and new immigrants, marginalized and silenced, and, yes, sometimes even cat videos—shout-out to Oreo Cat on TikTok.
Thousands of creators make a living and employ thousands of people. This is not a bunch of 18- and 19-year-olds doing very well, although it's great to see some of that too. The next generation of Canadian creators is not waiting on permission or approval from media giants. They are launching their careers on open platforms.
Creators have fostered the great Canadian cultural renaissance without an artists act, without a lobby group and without a handout. If you don't want to support what we're doing and listen to us when it comes to making decisions that will affect our livelihoods, we kindly ask that you get out of the way. There has been a divide created between digital creators and more traditional artists, but it is a false one. We support all artists in Canada, and we hope they get everything they deserve. We would love to help. We are all, in the end, just trying to find our audience. Digital creators just choose a different distribution model, one that relies on complex technical models and a global playing field.
I would like to end on a positive note. Despite a pandemic, despite a lack of access to any government programs or funding, and despite being a relatively small country when compared with the machine to the south, there are more people around the world today consuming Canadian content, generating export and tax dollars and exploring our culture direct from the mouths of Canadians than at any point in our history. That should be celebrated.
Thank you.