Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you for the question. That's a very important point. Again, when we're talking about online platforms, we're talking about services like Roku or others that provide access for third party programming services to reach the public and be distributed on a platform. One must

Canadian Heritage committee  Let me try to start, Mr. Julian. There's a gap now in the bill. That's the main thing. That's our key point—there's a gap. Right now the Broadcasting Act clearly covers the activities of cable and satellite companies. They're called distribution undertakings. It's clearly cover

Canadian Heritage committee  I can maybe start with that and then let Luc pick it up. It is a challenging environment right now. Obviously, change is upon us, and I think a lot of the challenges faced by independent broadcasters stem from the structure of the Canadian industry itself, not just the internati

Canadian Heritage committee  Luc, do you want to go with that?

Canadian Heritage committee  Which authorities are we talking about? First is the ability to set the terms of carriage, if necessary, for certain designated services. This could include, for example, APTN or TV5 Unis, or other existing 9(1)(h) services that are now made available to Canadians due to CRTC r

Canadian Heritage committee  You're asking what are the consequences will be if the bill does not include Canadian ownership as a policy objective?

Canadian Heritage committee  I would say on a policy level, any policy, regulation, service order or anything of that nature that sought to encourage Canadian ownership of our own services for that reason would be suspect. Essentially, it takes away a whole area of jurisdiction and the carving-out space in o

Canadian Heritage committee  If the government were taken to court on the vires of its ownership direction and it were struck down, then there would be no ownership restrictions within Canadian broadcasting.

Canadian Heritage committee  The results would be in the markets. The result would be that we'd see a hollowing out of Canadian ownership of broadcasting services and sales to foreign entities.

Canadian Heritage committee  Fair enough.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thanks for that. The way the law works, generally, is that it has two major parts. There are the policy objectives set out in section 3, and then there are the powers. You have to have both elements. You have to have policy objectives, and you have to have the power. You can hav

Canadian Heritage committee  Maybe I'll take that one. There's a lot that isn't defined in the bill. “Internet” isn't necessarily defined in the bill. These are terms that are generally understood and can be given meaning when the act is interpreted in its normal course. With regard to “terms of service”,

Canadian Heritage committee  IBG recently completed a study that demonstrates some of the problems with Canada's existing broadcasting system. Between 2015 and 2019, some Canadians cut the cord and the base of Canadian subscribers fell by about 6.5%. IBG's study finds that over this same time period, the rev

Canadian Heritage committee  Under the existing Broadcasting Act, the CRTC has the authority to oversee all aspects of the broadcasting industry, and the CRTC's powers are technologically neutral. Bill C-10 will change this. The CRTC's authority to oversee companies that use the Internet to distribute progra

Finance committee  If I can intervene, one of the key funding mechanisms for indigenous radio in the north has been the northern aboriginal broadcasting program, which is funded by Canadian Heritage. Funding to that program has really remained static since the 1990s, and it's not a lot of money—i