Canadian Heritage committee  It's the total lack of predictability. We're already in the dark enough, in a vacuum, and we're still struggling with all these issues. The budget was presented in April. As for the major festivals and events support initiative, as I said, the applications started to be submitte

Canadian Heritage committee  This would be the result of the work of the different branches of public health. As far as we're concerned, these are not optimal investments. If the cheques come in after the events, that's not a good thing.

Canadian Heritage committee  It's a complex issue. As far as we're concerned, we have been well served by the fact that there are horizontal programs, that is to say programs that apply to everyone, and sectoral programs. Thanks to all of these programs, we've been able to navigate and survive so far. The

Canadian Heritage committee  As I was saying earlier, we don't understand why all the festivals are de facto under the responsibility of Canadian Heritage when the tourism and economic impact of some of them should be recognized. Not all festivals are cultural, but all festivals are economic and tourism driv

Canadian Heritage committee  As I said at the end of my remarks, people are discouraged, frustrated and at the end of their rope. We need to add organizers to the job categories you mentioned. Imagine how things must be for the executive director of the festival with an annual budget of $5 million to $7 mil

Canadian Heritage committee  We'll have to see what happens. In the past, I've been happy when the budget was tabled, and then I was a bit disappointed. So I don't rely on announcements, I rely on the rollout of measures announced.

Canadian Heritage committee  Good afternoon, sir. A great deal of work has been done, yes. Some worthwhile measures were announced in the 2021‑22 budget, but they were generally not used properly. I mentioned to you that the major festivals and events support initiative had some problems. That $200 million

Canadian Heritage committee  You got it right, that is exactly what's happening. We began receiving the first application documents for the major festivals and events support initiative just before the holiday season. The initiative is administered by the economic development agencies. They are currently re

Canadian Heritage committee  Good afternoon, everyone. Festivals and Major Events Canada (FAME) and the Regroupement des événements majeurs internationaux (RÉMI) represent over 500 festivals and events in Canada. We were very pleased with the last budget. At that time, we thought that the COVID‑19 nightmar

Canadian Heritage committee  I totally agree. Organizers of most festivals and events tell me that one of the main challenges they face is unpredictability. You need to be able to budget for events in 2021, 2022 and beyond. At the moment, if you're yo-yoing around with budgets in different programs, it's cer

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you for the question. Let's say that the possibilities are multiple and it really depends on the events. We saw that, in the case of the Francos or the Montreal International Jazz Festival, they set up a digital component based on events that had already been recorded. The

Canadian Heritage committee  It would be the least it could do. In 2019, we welcomed this measure to reinvest in the two programs I was talking about. However, it still didn't make sense to us that it would be for two years. We had to make the correction. For these programs, we had the same budget for 11 y

Canadian Heritage committee  The question is indeed very relevant. I can tell you that deficits are very significant in all festival organizations for the reasons I've given you. Everyone had started spending normally between September or October 2019 and March. So there are significant deficits. People at

Canadian Heritage committee  Absolutely. Under the two programs I mentioned, there would no doubt be a way to get Canadian Heritage and the Department of Economic Development to work together on a program of an economic and tourism nature, with a strong cultural dimension. This would involve using events and

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you for the question. The existence of festivals and certain events is clearly in question. The current reality of festivals and events is that they have gone into hibernation and are trying as much as possible to retain their teams, expertise and assets so that they can g