By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – After the United States issued a warning yesterday about Canada’s online streaming legislation, an amendment to the Online Streaming Act intended to force foreign companies to contribute a similar level of Canadian creative and human resources as their Canadian counterparts drew strong criticism from the Canadian government and was defeated at committee.
“The government cannot support this amendment,” said Marc Gold, government leader in the Senate. “We need to recognize the reality that foreign players operating in Canada have global business models. It is just not realistic, in the opinion of the government, to expect that foreign broadcasters who operate in a global marketplace to be subject to the same provisions as Canadian broadcasters, notwithstanding the flexibility that Senator [Rene Cormier] introduced in the language of his amendment.”
Bill C-11 allows the CRTC greater power to regulate foreign digital platforms as a condition of operating in the country, including forcing these platforms support the creation, production and presentation of Canadian programming.
The current iteration of bill C-11 requires a lesser level of Canadian creative and other human resources from the foreign online giants, which was a major irritant for the Canadian cultural sector.
Earlier in the day, the United States Trade Representative Katherine Tai met with Canada’s minister of international trade Mary Ng and “expressed concern about Canada’s proposed unilateral digital service tax and pending legislation in the Canadian Parliament that could impact digital streaming services and online news sharing and discriminate against U.S. businesses,” according to a readout of Tai’s comments published yesterday.
“Ambassador Tai raised Bill C-11, and Minister Ng reiterated that this bill does not institute discriminatory treatment and is in line with Canada’s trade obligations,” Shanti Cosentino, press secretary in Ng’s office, said in response to a question from Cartt about the interaction.
During the committee hearing, Gold noted: “I’m also advised that the minister has noted publicly — or I am certainly putting it on the record here — that our trade partners would have serious issues with these proposed changes were they adopted. In that regard, I might ask the officials to elaborate on what the threat might be of foreign companies challenging these provisions under the terms of our trade agreements, notably CUSMA.”
The amendment was defeated 11 to 3.
