TORONTO – Canada’s media unions and associations were united in their criticisms of the CRTC’s broadcast policy changes and licence renewals announced Monday.
Unifor, which represents 12,000 journalists and media workers in television, newspapers, magazines, news websites and film production, said that the decision will allow major broadcasters to make further cuts to local news programming, and called on the federal government to intervene.
"The time for fine speeches from Jean-Pierre Blais about big media's corporate responsibility is over”, said Unifor media director Howard Law, in a statement. “A cabinet directive is needed to do for local TV…
Continue Reading
REGINA – Count SaskTel among those opposed to the CRTC’s proposed plan to phase-out the local service subsidy regime.
The local voice service subsidy was designed to keep wireline voice service affordable in high cost serving areas. The CRTC’s preliminary view is that customers with access to wired Internet at speeds as low as 1.5 Mbps have access to “reliable broadband Internet access service” which can replace traditional voice service and that these customers no longer need the voice subsidy.
SaskTel said that it agrees with the CRTC’s decision to establish a universal fixed broadband service standard for all…
Continue Reading
Will be harder to close stations
GATINEAU – The CRTC has tweaked broadcasting policy in Canada by standardizing Canadian Programming Expenditure (CPE) requirement at 30% for the country’s major private broadcasters. It has also imposed new spending requirements for local reflection news and information programming, commitments to Aboriginal and Official Language Minority Communities (OLMCs) as well as established a new process for TV station closures.
On the latter point, Broadcasting Decision 2017-148 highlighted the various opinions from the broadcasters with respect to a formal Commission process for station closures. Bell Media opposed a condition of licence, while Corus Entertainment didn’t object…
Continue Reading
New competitive call and hearing coming
GATINEAU – The CRTC today approved Rogers Media’s request that its OMNI-branded multicultural TV stations be converted to a must-carry, regionalized, specialty service – but only as an interim measure.
OMNI Regional, as of this September, is added to the digital basic service with mandatory carriage, as per section 9(1)(h) of the Broadcasting Act, with a wholesale fee to distributors of $0.12 per subscriber per month. It's license is for three years only.
While making sure OMNI lives on (Rogers executives had all but said during the license renewal hearing they would close the stations without this switch) the…
Continue Reading
OTTAWA and GATINEAU – The CRTC will announce its decisions on the license renewals for the large French-language ownership groups and large English-language ownership groups on Monday at 4:00 PM ET.
The Commission will also unveil its decision on Rogers Media’s request to approve the mandatory distribution of OMNI Regional on all digital basic TV packages.
Those decisions were originally intended to be released this week, but were postponed due to ongoing flooding in the region, as Cartt.ca reported.
Continue Reading
HALIFAX – The pending arrival of Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang is expected to boost the bottom line at DHX Media, which saw third quarter profits and revenues sink, the kids content producer, distributor and broadcaster said Wednesday.
Revenues for Q3 2017 of $78.35 million fell 7% from $84.10 million in the same period last year but slightly ahead of expectations, reads the company’s news release. In absolute dollars, the decrease was due largely to expected declines, in line with quarterly targets, in DHX Television, consumer products-represented revenues, consumer-products owned, proprietary production and producer and service fees, offset…
Continue Reading
DARTMOUTH – Newcap Radio owner Newfoundland Capital Corporation said Wednesday that flagging advertising rates and Alberta’s ongoing economic uncertainty helped to weigh down first quarter revenues and profits.
For the period ended March 31, 2017, revenues of $35.7 million were 3% lower than the same period last year, primarily due to revenue declines in the Alberta markets due to continued economic uncertainty in that region and declines in Ottawa due to downward pressure on advertising rates.
Profit for the period plunged 35% to $3.0 million year-over-year due to lower revenue and a higher provision for income taxes. Earnings before interest, taxes,…
Continue Reading
OTTAWA – Thirty-four campus and community radio stations will receive over $1.4 million from the latest round of funding of the Community Radio Fund of Canada’s (CRFC) Radiometres program.
The CRFC said that the funded projects will enhance local programming, attract and train volunteers, and increase community participation. Several of the projects revolve around local news, various partnerships between stations, schools and local organizations, the creation of a LGBTQ program, an audio art project, and an initiative focused on reconciliation A list of the 34 recipients is available here.
CRFC president Roger Ouellette said that the record number of applications…
Continue Reading
THE CRTC’S DECISION ON differential pricing practices will be praised or blamed according to one’s inclinations: whether to trust the innovative tendencies of carriers or the capacity of regulators to enforce fairness. Trust is the key, because each side of the argument honestly believes the other to be mistaken on a very large point of policy. How much weight do we assign to the deficiencies of regulation, as against the propensities of carriers to squeeze the tubes for profit?
Those inclined to trust the innovative propensities of carriers deplore the CRTC’s comprehensive decision to prevent unwarranted profit-seeking….
Continue Reading
GATINEAU – Continued flooding in Gatineau, home of the CRTC and many of its staff, means the big decisions planned for this week have been put off until next week, Cartt.ca has learned.
Multiple sources have been told by the Commission that since some staffers are dealing with flooding in their own homes (the Regulator’s offices have not been flooded) that the decisions on the license renewals for the large French-language ownership groups and large English-language ownership groups, originally intended for this week, had to be pushed back to next. The CRTC office was also closed Monday and remains so…
Continue Reading
