By Glenn Wanamaker GATINEAU – After two weeks of hearing about the structural intricacies of the Canadian television system, about fees for carriage, preponderance, genre protection, VOD, NPVR, and the sins of various competitors, CRTC commissioners heard from the performers Friday, the ones who put the Canadian into can-con.
Robb Wells, star and writer of the hit TV series “Trailer Park Boys”, and Julie Stewart, star of the Canadian drama “Cold Squad”, made a passionate plea to commissioners to maintain protective regulations while urging them to go further in providing incentives for more Canadian dramatic production.
Appearing with ACTRA executives, the two actors made seven recommendations to the CRTC that would see increased spending requirements on pay and specialty TV, increased BDU contributions to Canadian programming to at least 6% of their revenues, and imposition of Canadian Programming Expenditure requirements on Category 2 services when their licenses come up for renewal.
Earlier in the day, many of the same recommendations were made by the Coalition of Canadian Audio-Visual Unions, representing the Directors Guild, the Writers Guild, as well as ACTRA.
ACTRA President Richard Hardacre said that if the CRTC accepts, as some intervenors want, a fee for carriage of OTA channels by cable and satellite distributors, then some of that money should be earmarked for drama.
As well, he said, conventional broadcasters should be required to spend 7% of their ad revenue on Canadian drama, up from the current level of 2.3%
“The gap between Canadian drama and foreign programming spending is just getting worse,” he said, noting that private OTAs are spending just $38 million on Canadian English drama, while foreign spending is over $500 million. “We must not repeat this disaster on the cable and specialty side,” he said.
Current rules covering the cable and specialty channels are working, Wells said, because Canadian dramas, such as “Slings and arrows”, “Rent-a-Goalie”, and “ReGenesis”, are on the air and doing well.
“But if the CRTC changes the rules and the channels can put more U.S. shows on the air instead, not only will Canadian creators be out of work, our country will lose the capacity to tell stories. All because some show that’s recouped its budget in the U.S. market can be bought for less than it costs to produce the Canadian show,” Wells said.
“Removing genre protection, reducing access to a core of services, moving to a preponderance model, will have consequences equally as severe as removing exhibition and expenditure requirements for conventional broadcasters.”
Julie Stewart gave commissioners an example of how Canadian drama has suffered. Her show, “Cold Squad”, now seen on Showcase, was a success for CTV for seven years. But the network cancelled it in 2004, she said, opting to buy an American remake of the show, called “Cold Case”.
She presented the results of a poll commissioned by ACTRA and several other organizations, showing that Canadians trust the CRTC to be the guardian of Canadian content.
About 75% of respondents, she said, believe that less regulation will reduce choices of Canadian programs on TV.
In the morning presentation, CRTC Chair Konrad von Finckenstein pressed members of the Coalition on the question of carriage and if they believe the funds should be earmarked, such as for local content or news, as CTV and CanWest Global had suggested.
Monique Lafontaine, Director of Regulatory Affairs for the Directors Guild, argued that local services are not troubled sectors, and that the priority should be drama.
Stephen Waddell, ACTRA’s Executive Director, said that if carriage fee money was earmarked for local content, that might free up money for drama. But either way, he said, the Commission has to deal with the precipitous decline in current drama spending that has occurred over the past eight years.
