Procedure and House Affairs committee  But we do have criteria for allowing the parties, and I think that's why Radio-Canada has to be.... We haven't talked about the French market, which is very different. We have TVA, which is basically a Quebec-based network, and Radio-Canada, which broadcasts more across the count

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think the basic problem we have is that we don't have time to actually negotiate the terms of debate. We are just negotiating to see if there is a debate. If the best way to have a commitment from all parties, before the election is called, to participate in a national debate i

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I don't know. We haven't seen any proposal yet.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I know. It's kind of hard to—

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I'll chime in on the last point. I think in terms of credibility for the public, if there is a commission, it can't be seen to set all the rules and the themes and we broadcasters are just here to broadcast a debate. The public has to be convinced that we have an independent role

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I was saying that we were even in discussions with Google and Facebook to increase the reach of the debate on digital platforms. Essentially, as long as the consortium was involved in the exercise, the debate was not possible. There was also an opinion that a number of smaller de

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I get to do this because I was intimately involved in negotiating the debates, especially the French one. The 2015 election debate context was a strange one indeed. There was no national televised debate in English because one of the parties declined to participate. In French, t

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Am I talking too fast for the interpreter?

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I have a copy in English here if you want.

Canadian Heritage committee  Do you mean it must be the champion of digital? That is what we want as well.

Canadian Heritage committee  I do not think we can escape digital.

Canadian Heritage committee  We are proceeding in the same way for news. We want to ensure that digital also helps us showcase our content and archives and catch up on content we may have missed.

Canadian Heritage committee  I am not going to comment on projects that also involve the private sector. That is the subject of some quite specific negotiations. All we can say is that the plan for a new home for Radio-Canada was also made necessary by certain technological changes. That decision was based o

Canadian Heritage committee  That is all to your credit. As regards the news, you said that sometimes you listen to television journalists on the radio. That is not just the result of budget cuts. Our journalists work on multiple platforms now, on the web, radio, and television. We of course try to avoid re

Canadian Heritage committee  Absolutely, but we try to cast journalists who are the best fit for the story being reported. For a news conference, what we call “convenience news”, a journalist will do both. On the other hand, we have divided up news depending on what is ongoing. Often a journalist will do bre