There are 29 pages on the LPIF.
Evidence of meeting #69 for Official Languages in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was crtc.
A video is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #69 for Official Languages in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was crtc.
A video is available from Parliament.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
3:55 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
The document deals with that decision in particular.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
3:55 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
The document deals with the July decision.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
Stéphane Dion Liberal Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, QC
So are you able to address the request made by the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne du Canada, which recommends that the CRTC replace the LPIF with a local programming fund for official language communities?
3:55 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
When the decision was made in July, the commission was sensitive to the concerns of the communities. I think they were particularly concerned that money was allocated to Radio-Canada to provide French-language services to francophone minority communities. The commission clearly said that the issue would be discussed. It was discussed when the time came for Radio-Canada's licence renewal in November.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
Stéphane Dion Liberal Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, QC
Have you discussed this proposal? Have you dealt with it in one way or another?
3:55 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
The deliberations are not over yet. We have not made our decision yet.
3:55 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
A number of francophone groups have expressed their views. I will leave it at that. This is dangerous ground since the commission is an administrative tribunal.
3:55 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
No one is listening, right?
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
Stéphane Dion Liberal Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, QC
We are all listening very carefully. I simply wanted to make you even more aware of the fact that discontinuing the fund has created a real problem.
3:55 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
We are well aware of the problem and we are listening. Mr. Dion, I worked for the Department of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages for a number of years. I was an official languages champion before and I used to live in a minority setting. I am well aware of the challenges facing communities.
3:55 p.m.
Conservative
February 28th, 2013 / 3:55 p.m.
Conservative
Bernard Trottier Conservative Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Blais and Mr. Hutton, thank you for being here with us today.
Mr. Blais, in your comments, you talked about the importance of community radio. I come from Toronto where public hearings were held in 2012 to make a decision about the new radio frequency 88.1. There was one request to give the frequency to a francophone community radio station in Toronto and you received 17 requests in total.
I know that you did your evaluation and that Toronto is a large radio market. There are a lot of requests and a lot of people. The francophone community radio Choq-FM did not get the frequency. As a member of Parliament, I supported that request.
What were the criteria for making that choice? Why was another community, another format selected instead of an official language community?
4 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
Those files are always very difficult. Although there has been talk about the last frequency in Toronto on a number of occasions, engineers always find a new one, but the quality of each new frequency keeps getting worse. Yes, Choq-FM wanted to get 88.1 in Toronto.
When we do the evaluation, we analyze market needs and people's needs. There is a francophone community, but there are also a lot of multicultural communities. We also take into account young people, seniors, and so on. People submit their business plans. It is very difficult. I think we had almost two weeks of hearings. I was not there at the time, but the commission sat for almost two weeks to go through 22 requests.
For official language minority communities, we have a specific evaluation grid. We have made progress in that respect. In terms of the decision-making process, we ensure before and during a hearing that all our decisions are always made through the lens of official languages. We keep that in mind in our evaluation. Unfortunately, we must consider many other factors. In this case, Choq-FM was not able to change its frequency. By contrast, the community group here in Ottawa got a French-language community station.
We are trying to give consideration to a number of factors and it is not always easy. There are always more people who are disappointed than people who are happy.
4 p.m.
Conservative
Bernard Trottier Conservative Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON
In terms of community radio, what is the CRTC doing in other Canadian markets to support minority language communities? Even if it is not a question of having a channel for francophones only, what can the CRTC do to encourage French-language radio in other regions in Canada?
4 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
Radio is often the most efficient tool because it does not cost as much as television. That is what I have always said. For instance, in New Brunswick, I have recently met with people from Radio Beauséjour. They clearly told me that, without their radio, the use of French would have experienced a drastic decline in their community. So radio has a significant impact.
We are always very open to requests from community radio stations. It is always easier to find frequencies in less popular markets. As I said earlier, there was Ottawa where, unfortunately, the CRTC did not seem to find a frequency in the beginning. The government took action because it is its responsibility, and once the case was studied again, a licence was granted. I was at Canadian Heritage at the time, not the CRTC, but I saw the progress made on the matter. That's our system. At the end of the day, it all worked out.
In terms of support, I talked about being open to granting licences. There is also the financial support. The fund is a good tool. I talked about it in my presentation. In addition, we are demonstrating some flexibility. For instance, community radio stations want to exchange programming among themselves. We encourage them to do so.
4 p.m.
Conservative
Bernard Trottier Conservative Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON
I remember that, in northern Alberta, a country and western radio station used to broadcast French-language programs on Sunday evenings.
Is that model common in other regions of the country?
4 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
I wouldn't say that it is common, although there is nothing preventing it. It is a bit more difficult to approve the activities of bilingual stations in the Montreal market, since the opposite is often true. However, in francophone minority communities, there is nothing preventing it. We see it with Aboriginal languages, in the north. For part of the day, the programming can be in another language. The commission does not have a policy that is totally opposed to that formula. If people want to use it, they can.
4:05 p.m.
Conservative
Bernard Trottier Conservative Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON
With the advent of new technologies, is radio becoming less and less popular? I am talking about satellites and so on.
How has CRTC's decision-making process changed in light of those new technologies?
4:05 p.m.
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
When radio came about, newspapers were supposed to disappear. When television came about, radio was supposed to disappear, and so on. What we are seeing is that radio operators have improved the place of radio stations as local services. They broadcast the local news, traffic updates, the weather, and so on. Radio is still in demand, especially when people travel by car. We have to understand that most people listen to the radio in their cars. I recently saw that a car manufacturer announced that they would add the G4 network to the OnStar service in some cars, but we are far from switching to Internet radio. It seems that conventional radio is still in a good position for at least a few years.
