Thank you for the question.
I had the opportunity, as I had forecast to all of you, to meet with NNELS and CELA yesterday to talk about our mutual objective to transition the accessible publishing to make books accessible from the start. In recognition of the fact that this transition has stalled as a result of the pandemic, I was able to provide the organization with assurances that they will be receiving $1 million more for the 2021-22 fiscal year in order to bring their amount back up to $4 million, as it has been previously.
We agreed that the long-term vision for accessible publishing is to transfer to the publishing industry the responsibility for making materials accessible, that it shouldn't be incumbent on non-profits to continue to do this, and that we should have accessible publishing, but that this will take time.
Over the next month, we're going to work with them to see what funding level should stay in the future and, in fact, where that funding should come from. Should the relationship with ESDC, for example, peter out so there is a new relationship with the Canada book fund or with the publishing industry directly?
That was an excellent conversation yesterday, and we're on the same page.