GATINEAU – The Commission has added to what it wants discussed at next month’s conventional TV station license renewal narrow-hearing.
With the economic crisis fully blasting conventional TV’s ad revenues and threatening local content because that’s primarily where the private broadcasters have decided to cut costs, the Regulator is looking at ways to immediately help out the OTA sector.
Last year, the CRTC’s new policies governing Broadcast Distribution Undertakings and specialty channels said, among many things, denied the broadcasters’ requests to be able to charge a new fee for carriage of local signals, but said that they could charge DTH, cable companies and telco TV providers for offering distant signals (when customers can get CFTO Toronto in Vancouver, for example).
The Commission confirmed today that it is not prepared to listen to fee-for-carriage arguments again right away but will consider it “as part of the group-based licence renewal process,” announced in February, which will happen in 2010.
As for distant signals, which broadcasters have said the carriage of causes them revenue losses in the $50 million range, the Commission wants to know next month whether the date from which the TV stations can demand payment should be moved up from August 31, 2011 (when the new BDU and specialty policy comes into effect) to something much sooner.
“The Commission considers that there may be merit in advancing the date for the implementation of the new distant signal regime in light of the deteriorating economics for conventional broadcasters and that this issue should be discussed as part of the licence renewal hearing for private conventional television stations,” reads today’s notice.
Now the Local Programming Improvement Fund (LPIF) was also announced with the BDU/Specialty policy, but its launch date is this September. The additional 1% tax on BDU revenues is intended to raise about $60 million for local content for Canadian conventional broadcasters outside of major metropolitan areas, and only for those TV stations who are not slashing their spending (as all of them currently are).
But the Commission wants to re-examine the amount and conditions it set, thanks to how the economy has tanked since the fall. Specifically, it wants to know:
“a) whether the 1% of broadcasting distribution undertaking (BDU) gross revenues to be contributed to the LPIF will provide sufficient support for local programming in non-metropolitan markets, either on a short-term or longer-term basis;
b) what should be the terms of eligibility for access to the funds; and
c) what are the appropriate commitments regarding the production of local content and local news, on a station by station basis, that the Commission should insist upon.”
Comments are due by April 23.
