OTTAWA – "Should a Crown corporation that locks out its employees continue to get its full parliamentary appropriation?" asks the Canadian Media Guild today.
In an ad appearing today in the Hill Times, Parliament Hill’s weekly newspaper, the union called on the federal government to withhold CBC’s parliamentary appropriation during the lockout. However, one wonders who’s there to read it, since Parliament is on its usual long summer break and many MPs are in their home ridings or on vacation.
"CBC management should not be using Canadians’ money to finance the lockout," said Guild president Lise Lareau in a press release. "We hear from Canadians every day who are missing their public broadcaster. They shouldn’t have to pay for the programming they are being offered right now."
Predictably, the NDP is on board with the demand. "It is completely inappropriate to use public funds to help CBC management undermine public broadcasting," said federal NDP leader Jack Layton in the same statement. Layton has joined picket lines across the country since the beginning of the lockout, says the CMG release.
Since the lockout began on August 15, CBC management has received approximately $11 million to run all its services outside Quebec, according to the CMG.
“Unless the federal government intervenes, CBC management will continue to bank this money each week for as long as the lockout lasts,” says the release.
According to the union’s ad, a senior manager was heard to say before the lockout began: "as soon as (employees) are out, we are in a cash positive position, and the revenue continues to come in and the parliamentary allotment continues."
This manager was not named.
"It is immoral to let the managers of a Crown corporation turn their lockout into a profit centre," concludes the ad.
The Canadian Media Guild believes the money should be held in trust until the end of the lockout and used to expand local and regional programming once CBC employees are back to work.
