Radio / Television News

Regulatory flex should include shifting funds for news programming: Bell

By Ahmad Hathout Bell executives told the CRTC on Thursday that the broadcaster doesn’t need outside funding support for news production – just an easing of requirements on a losing product like community news. “We're losing $40 million a year in the conventional newscast,” said Jonathan Daniels, Bell’s vice president of regulatory law. “And so we looked at what would just be a better way that we could help finance that. And so we suggested that it was a redirecting of money from the community TV … because it's just not been a very successful product.” The executives said the...