Good morning, Mr. Lacroix, and thank you for being here. I welcome the tone and respect of your speech, which contrasts with that your vice-president unfortunately made in his appearance last week.
I absolutely understand the notions of independence and programming. You can repeat them three, four, five or 20 times; the fact nevertheless remains that, as the representative of a public television network, your mandate is to show what Canada is.
We can hail the work you've done to broadcast Les hauts et les bas de Sophie Paquin in English. We could talk about Mitsou again and all kinds of events. I'm a CBC/Radio-Canada viewer. Nevertheless we're talking about a gala whose purpose is to celebrate our country's songwriters.
I would have liked to see the parliamentary secretary, who has let us down again today, because it is important to hear from the government's representative. He no doubt has a reason for not being here.
I didn't understand why that kind of cut had been made, nor why Mr. Stursberg told us that when people hear francophones on CBC, they change channels. You remember that, and I don't think I'm causing a problem by saying it. At a meeting of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage, I asked you whether you changed channels when you heard an anglophone on Radio-Canada. The answer was obviously no.
We should therefore consider a number of questions. What was the reason for deleting the entire francophone component of that program? More specifically, for our television viewers, are there any studies on the subject? If your role is to bring together what has often been called the two solitudes, you have to do more than translate an event to show some sensitivity, for which I congratulate you. When a gala celebrates what our country represents, it is up to the CBC, even if Radio-Canada has refused to do so, to represent the two official languages, the two sides of the artistic field during that particular one-time event.
Are you aware of and sensitive to the concerns? We've talked about some good francophone artists. Can you guarantee us that we'll be able to see them next year? What do you intend to do, as president?