GATINEAU – For those of us who have been to a few of these CRTC get-togethers, Marjorie Lemieux will likely stick in our minds for a while.
Dressed in a bright purple sweatshirt, the Rogers Cable customer was on the first consumer panel of the day (a group pulled together from submissions via the “Stop the TV Tax” campaign) for hearing 2009-614, the one called by the CRTC in response to cabinet’s call for a report on the implications of paying a fee for conventional TV.
“My name is Marjorie and I want to stop the TV tax,” she began, adding she pays $80 a month to Rogers for two digital boxes and a wide range of channels carrying her favourite programming, which she proceeded to list. It was a pretty long list.
“I like to watch mostly comedy shows. Here are the show names and the channels I watch them on: 3 – Global, once in a while; 6 – A Channel, Ellen DeGeneres talk show; 13 – Soap operas the Young and The Restless and also the Bold and the Beautiful; OMNI1 – Two and a Half Men; 21 – The Weather Network in the evening and the morning; 27 – Poker Games; 31- American Justice; 33 – Larry King; 34 – 18 Kids and Growing, John and Kate Plus Eight and American Chopper; 43 – Reba and According to Jim; 47 – Frasier, Cheers; 54 – Seinfeld, That ’70s Show; 55 – Ice Road Truckers; 74 and 75 – Poker Games; 100 – Survivor, soap operas; 285/286 – Standup comedians; 287 – game shows; 288 – poker; 292 – Andy Griffith, Phil Silvers; 293 – Cosby and Roseanne; 719 – Jukebox Oldies; 720 – Flashback 70s; 721 – Remember the 90s; 722 – Classic Rock; 730 – Hot Country; 731 – Country Classics; 925 – Majic 100 Ottawa,” she said.
She really said all this, just like we’ve printed, to the sniggers of some (full disclosure, including me, at first). But she truly is an example of the cable and satellite customer, the Canadian TV viewer. She went on to say she avoids news altogether. “I don’t watch these channels because the news is too depressing… Global, CTV, CBS and CBC,” she said.
And it’s instructive to note the consumer panel she was on featured others who asked for more and better news, not less. And one said he no longer had any faith in his local news stations because of newsroom cutbacks. But then, consumers later in the day loudly sung the praises of their local stations, calling them absolutely necessary for their communities and causes.
Anyway, we listed Marjorie’s full favourites list in order to juxtapose it beside the big three Canadian broadcasters who came later on Tuesday. CBC, CTV and Canwest Global appeared in a united front to ask for a regulated skinny basic package of just local Canadian channels, the 9 1 (h) services and provincial educational stations which would retail for a CRTC-mandated price. Such a package “would ensure that Canadians have an affordable entry point into the Canadian broadcasting system,” said CBC president and CEO Hubert Lacroix. “It would also provide consumers with enhanced choice and control over their television service purchases.”
Marjorie, who said she lives off a disability pension, would seem to be one of the primary candidates such a small, low-cost package of channels would be aimed at. And yet she pays $80 a month, has two digital TV boxes and listed 29 different channels as her favourites.
The broadcasters had a strong, focused presentation, downplaying the main advantage to broadcasters with this skinny basic model they’re espousing is if they emerge with a value for signal regime at the same time, such a new basic package would bring them hundreds of millions in new dollars. And it would be done where the CRTC would set and cap the rate for such a small basic – which every subscriber would have to buy.
A skinny basic plus value for signal would mean increased costs for the BDUs, noted CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein. While recognizing it could be seen as a win-win for broadcasters and consumers, the chair added: “I don’t see a win for BDUs.” Any new fee, however small, will certainly pass on to the consumer, carriers have warned, no matter how it’s dressed up.
“There may be a loser out of this hearing and it may be cable,” said Canwest CEO Leonard Asper. “But they’ve been the winners for 30 years.”
However, if her cable bill continues to rise, Marjorie (who is no fan of the regular cable rate hikes, either) said she would “disconnect my cable and watch more TV shows on the Internet… or I would have to do without food, something I am used to having.”
She, as most consumers have said and are saying, also said she’d like to pick her favourite channels to pay for, a-la-carte.
• Earlier in the day, after Rogers, Bell, Bell Aliant, EastLink and Cogeco gave their opening remarks, filled with more hysteria about TV tax and the broadcasters’ attempt to penalize them for doing well with phone and Internet, von Finckenstein asked the group: “Can I suggest you turn the temperature down? Can you just talk about what’s really before us? This is not an epic battle.” He then added later: “Why are you frightening consumers rather than trying to solve this problem?”
• Later, during an exchange with RCI vice-chairman Phil Lind, von Finckenstein argued about which OTA stations would be considered to be providing local content and whether or not those providing no local content would be eligible for a value for signal negotiation, suggesting the way Rogers counts local OTAs in its markets is wrong since, for example, TVO and TFO do not provide any local content.
• When von Finckenstein then fretted about how more local TV stations could close and asked if there isn’t a way for BDUs and broadcasters to come to an arrangement for additional revenue, Lind retorted: “You’ve got LPIF for that… LPIF was designed to keep local stations around. Fee for carriage is designed to keep executives going to Hollywood. There’s a big difference.” So the chair asked (which was a big deal to me, if few others) whether or not the LPIF should just then be increased in order to bring more cash into local broadcasters. Said Bell’s regulatory head Mirko Bibic to that suggestion: “Absolutely not.”
• In its appearance Corus Entertainment’s VP and general counsel Gary Mavaara discussed how the world was changing rapidly and that a new fee to be paid for broadcast signals was not the way to go. It urged the CRTC to continue with policies like simultaneous substitution, LPIF and mandatory carriage, and “if local stations still fail, then it should let others try. We are certain that someone will find a way to serve the market,” he said.
• The broadcasters rightly suggested it’s time for the federal government to help the transition to digital television. In the U.S., the feds were very involved and bankrolled a coupon program for low cost digital converter boxes for those who couldn’t afford the upgrade and assisted in the marketing of the transition. In Canada, our government has been silent on this, they noted. Von Finckenstein asked the broadcasters to please submit direct ways the feds could “step up.”
“The basic principle is to follow the money,” said CTVglobemedia CEO Ivan Fecan. “The government will make $4 billion on the sale of the (analog TV) spectrum,” and can therefore certainly afford to help out.
• They also pushed local into local for the DTH satellite sector again, with Canwest’s Asper adding there is no “justification for DTH to dedicate capacity to low priority services such as adult programming while not carrying local television stations.”
• The broadcasters got a little testy with CRTC commissioner Peter Menzies when he took issue with the staffing and content cutbacks they have instituted over the past many months. “My concern here is for the consumer… and none of you fellows have invested anything in local over the past few years,” said Menzies. “The consumer has been getting less and less and less, and I’m still trying to get a clear answer as to why they should pay for more getting less.”
Asper and Fecan both immediately responded to Menzies, letting him know how many millions they do spend on local (despite newsroom cuts). “We really are investing in local and online media,” said Asper. Added Fecan: “I don’t see any basis in fact in what you said.”
Menzies shot back reminding them they have said that even with more money, the status quo on the news front is the best that can be hoped for. “If you’re offended by the record, fine,” added Menzies.
Von Finckenstein then intervened to cool down the suddenly charged debate and the broadcasters agreed the levels of local content will come again to the fore come license renewal time.
The hearing continues today with a group of independent broadcasters kicking it off (Pelmorex, S-Vox, CTS), followed by ACTRA, CMG, CFTPA and Shaw Communications, interspersed with more consumer presentations.
