Thank you.
I just want to confirm that the clerk does have the wording of the amendment.
We're good with it? Perfect. Thank you.
The amendment adds that the Minister of Heritage would come. The reason that I feel this is important is that there's evidence to suggest that the Minister of Heritage actually knew that these bonuses had been given out. The problem is not the fact that the bonuses had been given out in October; the problem is that the CEO of the CBC, Catherine Tait, came to this committee and seemingly misled us to believe that this wasn't the case, that bonuses were actually being withheld until a further decision could be made in March.
The Minister of Heritage ultimately is responsible for holding the CBC accountable. It seems appropriate that she would come to this committee and help us understand what happened here, so that's the reason for that amendment.
The second part of the amendment that I have added here is that they would come within seven days of the adoption of this motion. The reason this is important is that sometimes these types of motions can get punted down the line and not end up actually becoming a case for study here at this committee for quite some time. I do believe, as my honourable colleague Mr. Champoux has outlined, that this is of the essence. Important things need to be discussed. Accountability needs to be had. Questions need to be posed and answers need to be given. That's the reason for the timeline there.
If I may, my colleague Mr. Champoux didn't really speak to the essence of this motion. Perhaps he intends to do that in just a moment, but I'll speak to it from my side of things.
The overall motion calls for the CEO, Catherine Tait, to come to committee, and now I've added the Minister of Heritage, to answer with regard to bonuses that have come to light. Members of this committee will recall that just before Christmas, the president and CEO of CBC/Radio-Canada, Ms. Catherine Tait, announced that she would be cutting 800 positions. She said she was doing this because of what she called “chronic underfunding”.
It's important to remember that the CBC is given $1.3 billion annually and that the heritage minister actually increased that by another $100 million this spring. When asked whether or not millions in bonuses for top executives would be out of the picture based on this hardship, she said it was “too early to say”. In other words, she was reserving the right to give bonuses to top executives, but she was scrapping 800 jobs.
At the end of January, we asked Ms. Tait to come to this committee, where we had the opportunity to ask her questions with regard to the absurdity of this decision. During that time, she led us to believe that bonuses for 2023 had not yet been given and would be withheld until March. However, based on ATIP, access to information, we now find out that actually she had given $15 million in bonuses even before she had made the decision to scrap these 800 jobs. That means she put those bonuses ahead of those jobs. She put bonuses for executives ahead of 800 individuals who needed those positions.
Given that it seems she misled this committee, we have every right to bring her back and to ask her important questions. The reason this is so important is that at the end of the day, the CBC is a public broadcaster, paid for with public money, and it is our job at this committee to hold her accountable.