By Ahmad Hathout
The head of Quebecor on Thursday excoriated the federal government’s decision to up CBC/Radio-Canada’s annual funding while not forcing it out of commercial advertising sales.
The Liberals allocated an additional $150 million to the public broadcaster’s annual appropriation, which was a pre-election commitment from Prime Minister Mark Carney, but did not push it out of those ad sales for which private television broadcasters compete.
“Regrettably, this new government has missed an opportunity to support an industry facing ever-growing challenges and job losses at an alarming rate,” Pierre Karl Peladeau, president and CEO of Quebecor, said during…
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Liberals fulfill pledge to up CBC funding by $150M
By Christopher Guly
OTTAWA – While the federal government announced some $51 billion in cuts and savings and projected a deficit of about $78 billion in its budget delivered on Tuesday by Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne to address what he characterized as a “level of uncertainty higher than what we have seen and felt for generations,” Canada’s film and television industry welcomed a significant funding allotment as part of the government’s plans for $141 billion in new spending.
The Canadian Media Producers Association (CMPA) “applaud groundbreaking cultural sector investments” in the budget.
“Today’s budget…
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CBC on Monday announced a new 24/7 commercial-free CBC Kids streaming channel, available now to stream on CBC Gem and the CBC Kids YouTube channel.
The channel features CBC Kids animated and live-action series for kids aged two to 10, including: preschool favourite Dino Ranch, following the adventures of the Cassidy family’s ranch for dinosaurs; live-action, stop-motion series Go Togo, about the vehicles of Transitville; Hey Duggee, about a big dog and his friends; and Molly of Denali, following an Indigenous girl and her friends.
Radio-Canada on Monday also launched two French-language…
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CBC on Monday announced it has expanded its free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) channel portfolio with the launch of a new Schitt’s Creek channel on CBC Gem.
Set to launch additionally this fall on LG Channels and The Roku Channel, the Schitt’s Creek FAST channel features all six seasons of the Emmy Award-winning CBC original comedy series as well as the one-hour finale special Best Wishes, Warmest Regards: A Schitt’s Creek Farewell.
The channel joins CBC Comedy and dedicated Heartland and Murdoch Mysteries channels (launched…
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Proposing one-year trial for spoken word on FM
By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC on Friday abolished radio licence renewal periods, thereby making licenses indefinite with regular compliance audits that it says will streamline the process and reduce the burden on both the industry and the commission itself.
The regulator said it was often processing over 300 licence renewal applications every year, with multiple rounds of information requested from each station. But it found that the vast majority of stations were in “full compliance at all times, and most of the non-compliance was minor and could be addressed easily.”
The new Broadcasting Act allows…
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CBC/Radio-Canada on Wednesday announced Barb Williams, executive vice president of English services, is retiring from the CBC.
“Over her six year tenure at the national public broadcaster, Williams reimagined the way the CBC could serve existing audiences and welcome new ones, all while navigating the complexities of a global pandemic and the relentless pace of digital transformation,” reads a CBC press release announcing Williams’s retirement.
“The CBC we know today was born out of Barb’s vision to make our English Services platform-agnostic, a transformation that repositioned how Canadians consume CBC’s content,” CBC/Radio-Canada President…
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The Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS) and its music education charity MusiCounts announced last week the appointment of two new members, Ryan Balaski and Laurie Lee Boutet, to its 2025-2026 board of directors.
Balaski, senior vice president of music at Live Nation Canada, is a veteran live-music executive overseeing national concert strategy, with past leadership on festivals including Surrey’s FVDED in the Park, Rolling Loud Toronto and Vancouver’s Coast City Country Festival, said a CARA press release announcing the new board appointments.
Boutet, founder of Wednesday Management, is manager of…
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Blue Ant Media’s wildlife and nature brand Love Nature announced Monday it has greenlit a new three-part series exploring the wonder and resilience of wildlife along the northern coastlines of North America.
Filming across North America’s Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic coasts, Life on the Edge is produced by award-winning U.K-based production company Passion Planet with Vancouver-based River Road Films in collaboration with PBS, ARTE France and CBC.
The series “takes viewers to the meeting points of land and sea, where dramatic wildlife spectacles unfold along the world’s largest coastal rainforest, icy tundra, and rugged shorelines,”…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Rogers is seeking to purchase the rest of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment (MLSE) before it entertains outside investors.
The telecom’s chief financial officer, Glenn Brandt, said at a CIBC conference Thursday that Rogers has a call option to buy the remaining 25 per cent stake in the sports empire from Larry Tanenbaum’s Kilmer Sports, which has a put option to sell. Both options are due July 2026.
Brandt said while Rogers hopes to negotiate something sooner for that stake, he expects the option to be exercised anyway and, around this time next year, Rogers will close on taking…
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Cogeco urges easing of quotas
By Ahmad Hathout
The head of Stingray Radio said Thursday that overexposing Canadians to domestic music on radio is pushing them toward streaming services.
“Whether it’s a Canadian song they don’t like or an international song they don’t like, we risk driving them to international, foreign-owned, unregulated streamers,” Steve Jones told the commission studying the definition of Canadian content on audio services.
Jones noted that, through the company’s research and through the years, Canadian music has only captured roughly 10 per cent of consumption in Canada.
“So there is historical data that suggests that listeners have a certain threshold…
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