Including two that won’t cost a cent
By Greg O’Brien
CAL MILLAR DOESN’T want to kick the federal government while it is scrambling hard to keep Canadians healthy and our economy upright. However, broadcasters need more help and Millar and his fellow broadcasters have some ideas.
The president of Channel Zero (owners of CHCH, Rewind and Silver Screen Classics) is genuinely thankful for what the federal government has already done for broadcasters, and the country, in trying to manage an unprecedented health crisis that has decimated the economy while we all tried, and try, to do the right things to make sure…
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By Doug Barrett
HERITAGE MINISTER STEVEN Guilbeault’s appearance at the virtual Banff World Media Festival Tuesday morning was a bit of a revelation to me, and in a surprisingly good way.
We usually show up to these things expecting the three Ps: politics, platitudes and postponement – and certainly the various industry and media appearances of one of Mr. Guilbeault’s Liberal predecessors met all three of those tests, sometimes in the case of her appearance on Toute le Monde en Parle in 2017, famously so.
However, Guilbeault’s time Tuesday was, I almost hate to say it, refreshingly different.
Why?
First, he was well…
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By Christopher Guly
OTTAWA – The next tranche of funding from the federal government’s $500-million emergency response fund for cultural, heritage and amateur sports organizations during the pandemic announced two months ago will be rolled out in the coming days, while legislation modernizing the Broadcasting Act will have to wait until Parliament resumes its normal sitting this fall, Canadian Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault said on Tuesday during a Covid-19-prompted virtual edition of the Banff World Media Festival.
The deadline for applications for the first phase of funding concluded on June 12, and was targeted to organizations which have already received…
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By Denis Carmel
GATINEAU – During day two of a hearing over whether or not to allow certain radio stations to keep their licences because of repeated non-compliance with their licence conditions, the CRTC heard from the owners of CPAM (1410 AM), a commercial ethnic AM station that has seen four licence terms with apparent non-compliance issues, as we reported this week.
As well, CPAM had to respond to questions about CJMS, a country music (1040 AM) station. There aren’t very many AM music stations left.
As with the other cases heard this week, the company is mainly operated by volunteers…
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Was on wireless policy review panel
GATINEAU – The five-year term of Christopher MacDonald, the CRTC commissioner for Atlantic Canada and Nunavut expired Tuesday June 16, leaving the Regulator down at least two commissioners.
Former Alberta and Northwest Territories commissioner Linda Vennard’s term expired in May.
The federal government called for applications earlier this year for their replacements but have not named anyone, which is not surprising given how the Covid-19 crisis has delayed everything else. We say “at least” two commissioners because the Regulator can have up to 13 and currently has seven active commissioners. Chairman Ian Scott’s is the…
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By Denis Carmel
GATINEAU – In 2015, the CRTC decided to move from mandatory aggregated services to disaggregated services when it comes to wholesale high speed access services for the Internet, in Québec and Ontario.
That would allow competitors to interconnect closer to the client and lower the cost of service purchased from incumbents. In other words, instead of purchasing the local loop (or last mile) and the backhaul, they could buy just the local loop, including gaining access to fibre-to-the-premises portions of the incumbent networks.
The 2015 decision also determined the rules for the implementation of a transition from one regime…
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GATINEAU — U.S.-based cable TV shopping channel QVC will be added to the list of programming services and stations authorized for distribution in Canada, due to a stipulation in the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) on trade, the CRTC announced Monday.
Four years ago, the Commission ruled against an application by VMedia to add QVC to the list. VMedia then appealed the decision, and in September 2017 the Federal Court of Appeal referred the matter back to the Commission for reconsideration. In February 2018, the Commission issued a notice of consultation and asked for comments on VMedia’s request….
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First CRTC virtual hearing, in the time of Covid-19
By Denis Carmel
GATINEAU – On May 28th, the CRTC announced it would hold a virtual hearing to hear from five radio stations which appear to be in serious non-compliance with their terms of licence.
The stations in question are: CICR-FM Parrsboro, CKMN-FM Rimouski/Mont-Joli, CJWI Montréal, CJMS Saint-Constant and CFOR-FM Maniwaki.
The hearing was supposed to be held on May 12 but was put off to June 16, on May 28th. It will last three days, all online. A live audio feed of the hearing will be available on the CRTC website.
Given the…
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GATINEAU — In a decision published today, the CRTC has denied an application by Blue Ant Media to reduce the amount it’s required to spend annually on programs of national interest (PNI) for the eight specialty channels it operates in Canada.
Blue Ant Media’s channels include A.Side, BBC Earth, Cottage Life, HIFI, Love Nature, Makeful, T+E and Smithsonian Channel. In April 2019, Blue Ant filed an application to amend the condition of licence for its channels’ group licence in order to reduce its PNI expenditure requirements from 13.5% to 5% of the previous broadcast year’s gross revenues, as of September…
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By Lynn Greiner
THERE ARE MANY WAYS to get broadband connectivity into rural and remote areas, and at Canada’s Rural and Remote Broadband virtual conference (CRRBC) on Tuesday, a panel of experts spent a lively hour discussing the models they use and the challenges they face.
Led by moderator Colleen McCormick, who leads the Connected Communities BC program in the Ministry of Jobs, Economic Development and Competitiveness, panelists included Lisa Severson, director of communications at the Eastern Ontario Regional Network (EORN), Paul Ouimette, director of operations at NEOnet, Brian Cullen, chief administrative officer at the municipality of…
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