Thank you, Madam Chair.
I share some of the concerns that Mr. Waugh expressed earlier about the funding of the CBC. However, as Mr. Ripley said, news content generated by public broadcasters is news content that is eligible.
We want to regulate companies that produce news that is accessible to Canadians. In that sense, I tend to agree with the concerns of private companies, who ask why CBC/Radio‑Canada, which receives public funding, would also be entitled to benefit from this legislative framework.
However, I don't think we need to start questioning the funding of CBC/Radio‑Canada in depth now. I'm much more concerned about the fact that CBC/Radio‑Canada can add advertising left and right and subscription levels for some of the services it offers, when it already receives public funding.
I think ultimately there will have to be some in‑depth work done. Often we put this off until later. But we will have to look at it, because it causes a lot of frustration.
Personally, I don't think CBC/Radio‑Canada should be excluded from Bill C‑18, because of the nature of the bill we're dealing with, but I would be very supportive of looking at the various business practices of CBC/Radio‑Canada that are causing harm to private companies soon.