Official Languages committee  In 2009.

Official Languages committee  Yes, it's very much within the interests of satellite companies, because they're national services. They not only have very good French and English services, but in some cases they also actually have very good bilingual services for someone like me who navigates the two languages.

Official Languages committee  What we are referring to are services to help communities that need better access to radio services. In that sense, they are considered bilingual because they serve both francophone and anglophone communities. Services like that are not very common. They support access to radio broadcasting.

Canadian Heritage committee  One thing to remember is that for the companies we're dealing with, their main objective is to keep people watching them, so they have a self-interest in making sure that all the people continue to watch them. As for what we will be putting in place in our public service announcements, we are ensuring that the companies tell Canadians what they have to watch for, what they have to think of, and what the new channels will be, and that they have both a website and a 1-800 number for those people to contact.

Canadian Heritage committee  I believe you will see both. You will see both. Right now the Department of Canadian Heritage does run a website. They are working on it to improve it. We will be requiring that each of the broadcasters actually has the specific information related to the specific channel they're broadcasting on, what's happening, and the information with respect to their local market.

Canadian Heritage committee  Basically, they will be getting information from the channel they watch and the origination point they watch. That will not change with respect to the digital transition.

Canadian Heritage committee  What we've seen is in the context of the transactions, both the Shaw acquisition of Canwest and BCE's acquisition of CTV. The latter one is not concluded, so I'll just try to keep talking about Canwest and Shaw. In their case, what they have put forward is an aggressive transition proposal under the tangible benefits packages that they had to provide to us.

Canadian Heritage committee  Yes, we could.

Canadian Heritage committee  The 900,000 households are located in areas where conversion will take place. These are households that do not subscribe to cable or satellite services. As you know, if someone subscribes to cable or satellite, they have nothing to worry about; nothing will change for them. The 900,000 remaining households include—

Canadian Heritage committee  That's correct.

Canadian Heritage committee  Exactly. As the chair has indicated—to confirm his statement—this number includes people who do not have a television receiver. The commission has considered this figure in a general sense in order to pinpoint the source of the problem. Therefore, this figure includes people who do not watch television or who have a television receiver like the one in this room.

Canadian Heritage committee  Yes, we do have them, but not on hand. We can provide them for you.

Canadian Heritage committee  We have found a solution to the problem. As we stated in our conversation with Mr. Del Mastro, Shaw has proposed, as part of the transaction in which it acquired Canwest Television, to set aside $15 million for providing satellite service to all 31,500 households and not only to 15,000 households.

Canadian Heritage committee  Free of charge.

Canadian Heritage committee  Correct.