Twelve roles impacted by the cancellations, CEO says
By Linda Stuart
The Cable Public Affairs Channel (CPAC) announced Tuesday it is ending production of its two nightly political news programs — PrimeTime Politics and L’Essentiel — as the not-for-profit media organization is faced with “accelerating revenue decline and continued uncertainty in the broadcasting landscape,” it said.
The announcement comes after the CRTC last week approved a three-cent increase in the price broadcasters must pay to carry the CPAC service.
“The CRTC’s recent approval of a 3-cent rate increase, set to take effect this September, is helpful in the short-term and comes at a time when financial pressures on our organization have intensified,” reads a Tuesday press release from CPAC.
CPAC noted subscriber erosion has nearly doubled since 2024, and delays in modernizing the broadcasting system “have prolonged the uncertainty around when predictable, reliable, and stable long-term funding mechanisms will be in place.”
To navigate the current broadcasting environment, CPAC has “been forced to make difficult and necessary decisions,” it said. “Effective today we have cancelled the production of PrimeTime Politics and L’Essentiel. Esteemed colleagues have left CPAC today.”
“Today, we are sharing difficult news,” Christa Dickenson, CEO of CPAC, said in the organization’s press release. “This is not a reflection of the people affected. Our former colleagues are dedicated and talented professionals who have made meaningful contributions to Canadian journalism and broadcasting. We are grateful to them and thank them sincerely.”
CPAC said it “remains committed to its mandate of providing coverage that is uncut, unfiltered, and without spin.”
The half-hour news programs PrimeTime Politics and L’Essentiel were hosted by Michael Serapio and Marc-André Cossette, respectively.
In a LinkedIn post Tuesday evening, Serapio confirmed he has been let go by CPAC.
“So I won’t bury the lead. PrimeTime Politics is cancelled and I’ve been laid off. I won’t lie. It hurts. And I’m still in shock,” Serapio wrote.
“I had a chance to work with incredible people at CPAC (Cable Public Affairs Channel / Chaîne d’affaires publiques par câble) who were great colleagues, and will always be treasured friends.
“I had a chance to engage in the national discourse, powered by women and men who want to make Canada a better place than it already is,” Serapio continued. “Lucky me. I got to be a part of it (and I hope I was able to make a meaningful contribution).”
Serapio went on to thank those who took his calls, accepted his invitation to be interviewed, shared their thoughts and insights, and made his time at CPAC so enjoyable.
He now lists himself as a freelance journalist on his LinkedIn profile.
In a phone interview with Cartt Wednesday morning, CPAC CEO Christa Dickenson confirmed bilingual anchor Cossette has been retained by CPAC. He will continue to host and interview guests for long-form news content, which will be posted online immediately, instead of being aired in a half-hour TV time slot at night, Dickenson said, adding most of CPAC’s viewers consume the service’s content via its website.
“What we’re seeing is the greater content is being consumed online,” Dickenson said. “The greater content is being consumed live or on immediate video on demand. So if it’s available at 3:20, it will be available online at 3:20 versus 8:00 p.m. Now, this is a sudden change, as you can imagine.”
As for CPAC’s television channel itself, for the near future, its content will be programmed as though it is an off-week for Parliament, Dickenson said.
“We have two different programming grids for the television channel. We have a programming grid for when the House is sitting, and then we have a different substitute grid for when the House is not sitting because it sits only 26 of the 52 weeks a year. So right now, we’re reverting back to that programming grid regardless of which week it is,” she said.
The channel’s Public Record program, which primarily airs current and archived long-form coverage of conference panel discussions, usually fills out the programming grid around CPAC’s coverage of the House of Commons and the Senate, Dickenson explained.
“The reality of CPAC is that we output usually 20 to 24 hours of new content every single day. That would be the proceedings in the House of Commons, committees. We stream online up to 14 simultaneous feeds. So we are looking at really optimizing that offering,” she said.
All told, 12 roles at CPAC were impacted by the shutdown of PrimeTime Politics and L’Essentiel on Tuesday, Dickenson said. That’s a combination of terminations and contracts not being renewed, she said, adding it represents 15 per cent of CPAC’s employees.
“We already did a similar exercise of a 10-per-cent cut in 2024. So we have now cut in less than two years 25 per cent of our personnel,” Dickenson said.
“These are sad times, hard times for the entire broadcasting industry. What we did, we did not want to do, but we had to do,” she added.
In a post on X Tuesday afternoon, Culture Minister Marc Miller wrote: “Thinking of the employees affected by layoffs at CPAC—an important voice in Canada’s democratic coverage. I’m disappointed that the CRTC is not moving faster to fully implement the Online Streaming Act, a law that ensures online streamers pay their fair share.”
