GATINEAU – The main attraction on Tuesday, day 10 of the hearing into the policies governing specialty channels and their carriers, was a posse of independent broadcasters arguing that the system as it now stands, isn’t quite as broken as some would have everyone believe.
Of course, the system ain’t quite right, but it’s not broken – and surely doesn’t need the massive overhaul proposed by cable and satellite companies, said the group
The panel featured S-Vox (VisionTV, The Christian Channel, One: Body, Mind and Spirit), Stornoway Communications (ichannel, bpm:tv, The Pet Network), TV5, APTN and Ethnic Channels Group (owners of 10 third language category two digi-nets).
This is the group with the least power in the system, the most in need of protection, they all said. “We are its most fragile participants,” said Stornoway president and CEO Martha Fusca, whose channels have yet to earn a profit, six years after the launch off its flagship. (ichannel, a category one digi-net).
In fact, she added, if the policies aren’t shifted to help smaller services like hers gain more carriage with more distributors, she may be forced to abandon her pair of category twos, bpm:tv, a dance channel, and the Pet Network. Shaw Communications doesn’t carry bpm:tv on cable or satellite and Bell ExpressVu does not offer Pet.
Fusca wants new policies that would allow category two digi-nets to move up a category into must-carry range by spending more on Cancon – and showing more Canadian programming.
Having been “ground down” on wholesale fees for bpm and Pet, Fusca said she has about two more years to see those channels turn a profit, otherwise she will have to shut them down.
Without more distribution, without more access, and without a mandated minimum wholesale fee, bpm and Pet “won’t exist in a couple of years, even if they don’t throw me off the systems I am already in,” said Fusca.
But what if genre exclusivity was abolished, or diminished, which has been another key question over the past fortnight? That would leave other Canadian broadcasters free to push into ichannel’s public service issues-based niche and “likely, the channel would be unable to continue operations,” said Fusca.
The loss of carriage from any one BDU would do immense damage to ichannel and her company’s existence.
Slava Levin, president and CEO of Ethnic Channels Group, made his pleas on behalf of those Canadians whose mother tongue isn’t English or French. He decried the CRTC’s shift in 2004 to relax the genre protection rules for Canadian third language services, which severely impacted his business since foreign channels in the same niches were allowed in.
When it comes to access for such Canadian channels, “(i)f a BDU distributes a foreign third-language service, then the BDU should distribute at least one Canadian third-language service in the same language,” said Levin.
Since the 2004 shift in policy on ethnic channels, ECG has seen its ideas borrowed and partnerships unravel.
“BDUs go directly to foreign programming services and say, literally, ‘You don’t need a Canadian broadcaster. You don’t need Ethnic Channels. We’ll bring your service into Canada ourselves,’” explained Levin.
“Meanwhile, the same BDUs suggest to us that there is no need for our services. Or worse, they take our suggestions for new services and then cut us out of the picture. This actually happened to us. We were told that there was no way they would distribute ‘communist’ Chinese channels when we were in negotiations to bring programming from these services to Canada. The next thing you know, there was an application by the BDUs to the CRTC to add these same services to the lists.
“Respectfully, we think that the CRTC lost an opportunity for something amazing to happen in Canadian ethnic broadcasting when it removed genre protection for our services,” Levin continued.
“In 2004, we had only just begun to benefit from the CRTC’s rules for new Canadian third-language services… Then, the rules changed. There could, easily, be in excess of 100 Canadian third-language channels in existence today. Instead, I believe there are about half that number, in total.”
And, as many of the other broadcasters who have come before the Commission have stated, VOD needs its own review to re-set some of the rules governing that platform (“We may or may not do that,” is what CRTC chair Konrad von Finckenstein had to say about a separate VOD hearing yesterday). “(T)he danger with too much deregulation of VOD or SVOD is that it would allow the BDU to by-pass the Canadian broadcaster entirely,” said Levin.
“We are as independents very concerned – about the creation of a parallel broadcasting system that may result from this,” added S-Vox CEO Bill Roberts.
“If a BDU could, for example, package its own third-language programming on VOD, insert ads and sell it on a subscription basis, then what role is there for independent programming services like ours? It’s simple, none,” said Levin.
As for Canada’s other native languages, they are served by the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, whose CEO, Jean LaRose also spoke Tuesday. Along with his independent broadcast peers, he asked for an all-Canadian basic service, made up of fewer channels at a much lower price. But not just that – the Canadian basic channels should be lined up contiguously, so consumers could easily find them.
“Why not offer Canadians a smaller basic package that has only local Canadian channels?” asked LaRose. “Canadian specialty channels making core commitments to Canadian reflection (as indicated by their Canadian content and expenditure obligations), such as the independents represented at this table and the Weather Network, national news services, and the few other services, such as CPAC, and the other 9(1)(h) services that are recognized as being of exceptional importance.”
But why contiguously? Because APTN, despite its 9(1)(h) status, is not often carried below channel 30 and with some distributors, beyond channel 100. “People will spend more time programming their remote to find us than actually watching us,” said LaRose.
“I have proposed an approach that some could dismiss as self-serving. I would argue that almost everything proposed to the panel over the past 2 weeks has been self-serving. After all, for many of us, the outcome of this hearing will determine our survival.”
Expect the hearing room today to be crowded as Shaw Communications takes centre stage. Cartt.ca will be there.
