Official Languages Committee on May 12th, 2009

[Rick Brace]

I can't really.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

I ask because what you're saying is you would have made them whole; you would have given them the revenue they would have lost because nobody was watching the shows they were playing because they were now airing your Olympic coverage. So they were getting something. But you never got past that.

I'd like to know what that answer is. I will ask CBC when they're here. Is there any way you could also do an evaluation? I would love to hear your estimates on that.

[Rick Brace]

It is probably better to ask them. They will give you an estimation.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

We will.

[Rick Brace]

We estimated their rate cards. I don't think it would be beneficial or helpful to the committee, because it would simply be a guess.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Okay, fair enough.

Now when it comes to airing for a month or six months before, I appreciate what you've said about it being complex, and whatnot, and I also heard you say you're still going to look at it. I want to thank you for that because I think it's another step forward. I'm not saying that we're going to get six months, but if there is a way to allow our francophone communities to see more of the coverage ahead of time, I think that's important. So thank you again for that.

[Rick Brace]

It's going to be a case of all of us working together, as I said to the Senate committee, because we're going to need your help. This is a situation where every negotiation is a commercial negotiation. There's a social responsibility overriding this that we're all focused on. But at the end of the day, we have to convince every small cable company to come onboard with us. When it comes to free previews, or the Olympics themselves, it could be different; it could be checkerboard. It's not as if we're doing one deal and one size fits all.

So I just want you to be cautious on that. We may be coming back to ask for your help and support.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

You should know that we're supportive of allowing all Canadians to see these very important games.

I just want to correct a couple of things that I've heard on the record here today. Madame Guay mentioned China's broadcasting. China did not broadcast all of the games in French in their own country. They did broadcast them in Chinese—and that is their language of majority. They broadcast much of them in Canada in French and English, with the help of our broadcasting teams here. I just wanted to correct that.

And VANOC is very supportive. They are very much in agreement that we need to do our best to make sure that as many francophone Canadians as possible can see these games. They've been supportive of your efforts.

[Rick Brace]

Thank you for your questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you, Madame Glover.

Monsieur Godin.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

This is like a chess game. You played your side this morning. There doesn't appear to be that much dialogue between Radio-Canada and you. You've shown your hand to the committee, but the negotiator you're negotiating with isn't here. It's on the air or has a representative here.

You said you already had a proposal and that you weren't here to negotiate, but a good mediator might perhaps be necessary. Point 1.1 states that advertisers' losses could have been offset by CTV, the group. Now they're offering to do their production. If they can do their own production, can they do their own advertising as well?

[Rick Brace]

No. The answer to that is that it totally goes against the model we have. You can't have two people.... For example, if Coke is one of our sponsors, you couldn't have them selling Pepsi. You'd get that conflict.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Normally, when you see a Coke refrigerator in a store, you don't see a Pepsi refrigerator, and vice-versa. I understand that; that's competition. However, here we're talking about a public sector agency and a private sector organization. Could the consortium offset the losses incurred by Radio-Canada on sponsorships?

[Rick Brace]

You know, I don't want to negotiate in public. I think that—

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Well, you threw the proposal on the table.

[Rick Brace]

I put the proposal on the table.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

You started it.

[Rick Brace]

No, I put the proposal on the table, and it's something we can discuss. We can start it as a discussion with SRC, but I can tell you that any kind of notion where SRC would be selling commercial time is an issue.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

The good news is that the door is still open.

[Rick Brace]

That's good news. It never really closed. As I said, we go back to our first proposal, which we thought was fair, and we've come a long way.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

You're finished, Mr. Godin. We won't ask you your age. You have some time left, but we will acknowledge that you have reached the age of wisdom.

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

The age of reason!

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

We can hear one or two comments.

Mr. Petit wants to speak.

[Daniel Petit, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Brace, we talked about francophones outside Quebec, but I would like to talk about anglophones in Quebec who are in the minority. I'm not talking about Montreal, but about the North Shore, where, as my colleague from New Brunswick was saying, they don't always have cable. Some people have television sets with what I call rabbit ears. There are at least four or five villages that I know personally in Gaspé, along the North Shore, that have been strictly anglophone for nearly 200 or 300 years.

Is that group covered? Are there any problems? Is it the same thing for francophones outside Quebec? Have you covered that group in your work plan? They want to watch the Olympic games too.