Evidence of meeting #115 for Canadian Heritage in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was company.
A recording is available from Parliament.
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
That's correct. We discussed the process that we would use with our unionized employees, and that process was endorsed by Unifor. I can unpack that for you, but I'm mindful of time.
Liberal
Anna Gainey Liberal Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC
Yes, I'm just curious, because we did—I think it was referenced earlier as well—receive a letter from Unifor outlining quite a different position on this situation.
There was a rally held in Ottawa on March 19. The workers took to the streets. They had a very clear message that seemed to be quite in opposition to the job cuts. Can you clarify this?
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
I will with pleasure.
About 800 unionized positions were removed from the Bell workforce, and 61% of those affected employees actually took a voluntary separation package. They said they were willing to go, and so that's an important factor here.
As it relates to the union process, over five weeks we had 10 days of meetings with union representatives to present the initiatives we would undertake. We obtained the union's consent to offer the voluntary separation packages, which the majority of unionized employees took.
Before proceeding with the initiative on March 20, we also conducted a three-hour meeting with the union leadership to explain the process by which we would engage with the employees. Unifor didn't raise any concerns. We did those meetings by video because most of the employees affected were working from home and were in various parts of the country. That was fully communicated to employees.
Regardless of which process we followed, clearly these had important impacts on the individuals affected, and we were very sensitive to that.
Liberal
Anna Gainey Liberal Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC
Then how do you explain the correspondence from the national president of the union to the entire committee with respect to their view of the cuts?
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
You would have to ask. I can't speak for Unifor.
Liberal
Anna Gainey Liberal Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC
If I had more time I would read it all into the record for you, but it's quite an extensive piece of correspondence.
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
I'm sharing the facts with the committee because the facts are important. We want to treat the unionized employees with care. Unifor has indicated that we have 19,000 unionized employees, so they are an important part of our workforce. We have actually grown the unionized membership on the communication side through hiring more field technicians—which are high-paying jobs—because we have invested so much in building fibre Internet, and consumers are buying the service because it's world-leading technology. We have a massive lead over cable, so consumers come, which means we need more field technicians to connect customers to our great network. That has created a 14% increase in union membership. We're investing in that workforce.
Liberal
Anna Gainey Liberal Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC
Thank you.
I want to go back to the impact on Canadians with respect to the consolidation. In June 2023 you announced that you were moving to a single newsroom across all of your media brands. Have you completed this transition?
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
We're in the process. We're quite a long way down that path. The viewer comes first. The objective is to be able to deliver more news over all the platforms consumers engage in. In order to be able to make that work, we have had to become more efficient in many areas. One is sharing infrastructure across news teams. Another is sharing resources behind the camera, and a third one is hiring multi-skilled journalists who can file stories digitally at six o'clock or 11 o'clock on any of our networks.
That's how we have gotten more efficient to deliver more news.
Liberal
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
We have newsrooms in multiple cities.
Liberal
Anna Gainey Liberal Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC
Oh, so you haven't completed moving to a single newsroom? It sounded as though you were going to close newsrooms in order to have one major newsroom.
Liberal
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
No. We're streamlining the number of newsrooms we have and making sure that journalists, for example, aren't dedicated to one show at one particular time of day. Now we have journalists who cover news as it happens and file those stories with whatever show it is, whether that's on television or on any digital platform that's the most relevant for that particular story.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
The time is up, Anna. Thank you.
We have 20 minutes to go before 5:30. I'm making a suggestion that we go with five minutes for the Conservatives, five minutes for the Liberals, and two and a half and two and a half minutes. That's 20 minutes, and we can end this meeting.
I don't know if bells will start before that, but let's go with that right now.
For the Conservatives, I have Rachael Thomas.
Bloc
Martin Champoux Bloc Drummond, QC
I have a point of order, Madam Chair.
You just mentioned that the bells may start ringing in a few minutes, which is very likely.
If we start a round of questions, I would like to make sure that the parties are in agreement to continue—
Liberal
Bloc
Martin Champoux Bloc Drummond, QC
I was just reminding you that the bells are probably going to start ringing in the next round. I would like to make sure that all parties agree to continue despite that, so that each party can have its turn to speak.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Yes, we can do that.
It will be a 30-minute bell, so we could have everyone agree to add an extra 10 minutes.
Thank you.
Mrs. Thomas, you're sharing your time with Mr. Gourde.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Mr. Bibic, I'm curious. Do you support Bill C-11?
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
Is that the Online News Act?
No, Bill C-11 is the Online Streaming Act.
We did support the act in the sense that it was a good step towards fixing the broader issues, but it's only one step. Far more is required.
Conservative
President and Chief Executive Officer, BCE Inc.
Yes.
Again, that's just one step, but a broader discussion is required in terms of levelling the playing field between the Canadian broadcasters and the major Internet platforms that derive so much revenue from Canadian consumers without contributing back to the ecosystem.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Bill C-11 was created by the current government to stifle innovation and creativity. It shuts down YouTubers or digital-first creators, and it very much puts more money in the pockets of traditional broadcasters, such as Bell Media.
It's no wonder, then, that you would support this bill because, of course, it stifles competition and very much acts in your favour.
What's interesting, though, is that Bell is an incredibly profitable company and is already taking hundreds of millions of dollars from this government, yet it still stands with its hands out for more. It makes no qualms out of the fact that creativity and innovation in this country are being stifled.
Interestingly enough, one of the talking points that you keep returning to is that this is one of the big problems in this country: that creativity, innovation and productivity are being stifled. However, you're actually a part of that problem by supporting Bill C-11. You're a part of stifling that. You're a part of holding us back from going into the future, instead insisting that a broadcasting act that is incredibly antiquated in nature is applied to the Internet.
With all due respect, you are a part of the problem. It is for the sake of selfishness, and it is for the sake of lining pockets with more money that you want to be handed over, based on the creative content that is being generated by these digital-first creators and put out there. You want them to take 30% of their revenue and put it toward your antiquated model.
I find that alarming. I find it very concerning that Bell is functioning in that manner while receiving hundreds of millions of dollars from the government.