Mr. Speaker, the member repeatedly referred in his comments to broadcasters, yet I do not believe I heard him once mention producers of shows. For broadcasters to stay in business, they need a whole production industry and that comes from requirements of Canadian content, from financial support and so forth. I did not hear him mention any concerns regarding producers.
He did mention that the broadcasting industry is doing very well financially, and that is true, but the producers in the country, independent ones and others, are not doing very well. Their margins have been reduced to almost non-existence.
Would the member acknowledge that if we do not have constant funding and requirements, that producers will be in jeopardy and therefore the whole edifice could crumble if we do not have the content for broadcasters? We would then be relying strictly on foreign content which is already quite pervasive on our airwaves.