Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, members of the committee, thank you for giving us the opportunity to express our views during these consultations.
The Mouvement pour les arts et les lettres represents over 10,000 professional artists, artisans, writers and cultural workers. For 10 years, the MAL has been advocating for a substantial increase in public funding for the arts and culture in Quebec and Canada. This call for more funding has become all the more pressing in light of the growing challenges in terms of how Canadian creative content will position itself and how it competes in the new digital world economy.
To meet these challenges, our brief lays out six intervention priorities: intervention in the chain of research, creation, production, promotion and distribution of works by artists from Quebec and Canada; intervention in the sustainable development of arts and culture; intervention to enable better access to basic and applied research in the arts; intervention for international promotion and distribution; restoring cultural diplomacy; and, lastly, intervention in the digital economy.
These six priorities translate into three recommendations. Basically, these recommendations have not changed in years. However, they have become more urgent because our various sectors seem incapable of integrating very talented and successful new artists, they seem incapable of dealing with the increased costs of production, promotion and development of new markets, or with the rising costs of national and international distribution, and, lastly, they seem incapable of helping to improve, even a little, the living and working conditions, or the pay, of artists and those who work in the arts and culture sector.
The recommendations of the Mouvement pour les arts et les lettres are shared by other Canadian coalitions as regards the Canada Council for the Arts and the implementation of new measures to support the promotion and distribution of our arts.
The digital reality is catching up with us very quickly, and if we are to skilfully negotiate these new changes, we will have to count on strong support measures and commensurate funding.
Our first recommendation is that the budget of the Canada Council for the Arts be increased to $300 million to help close the gap between what is needed and what the council can give, because this gap is increasingly affecting the dynamism and vitality of our sectors, including our ability to innovate and to stand out in an extremely competitive environment.
The digital universe is having a huge impact on us and will provide us with many more opportunities to create, promote and distribute our works. We therefore have to occupy this territory with audacious Canadian works, otherwise we risk becoming marginalized.
Our second recommendation is to restore the funding for the promotion and distribution of works by artists from Canada and Quebec. Day in and day out, we see the damage being done because these programs were eliminated. Please understand that artists earn a lot of income from the distribution of their work. Failing that, artists and workers cannot find work.
Soon, that is, by November 1, the International Exchange for the Performing Arts, CINARS, will reveal the impact the cutbacks have had on its ability to find new markets and on its touring productions.
Therefore, my second recommendation is to reinvest $25 million each year in international support and distribution.
My third recommendation deals with the new digital economy and the fact that we should have strategies which are adapted to our sectors, and the financial support to go along with that.
Thank you.