OTTAWA – A coalition of American border television stations is hoping that the CRTC’s Let’s Talk TV policy initiative will help them in their quest for compensation for their over-the-air programs that are being imported and retransmitted in Canada.
The group, which includes ABC, CBS, NBC and CW affiliates in Detroit, Buffalo and Minneapolis, says it’s seeking equitable and non-discriminatory remuneration opportunities under Canada’s TV retransmission regime, as Cartt.ca has reported.
The group maintains that Canada's Broadcasting Distribution Regulations were amended in 2011 to provide retransmission consent and new remuneration rights for operators of distant Canadian TV stations, but that American TV stations imported into Canada are being “denied an equitable and non-discriminatory right of remuneration exercisable under conditions set out in the new distant station regime.” What these stations want is more than the money they already receive indirectly from this fund.
Frank Schiller, secretary to the working group, told Cartt.ca that bilateral consultations between the United States and Canada on the retransmission of television broadcast signals is underway, prompted by a letter from the U.S. Department of State to the CRTC.
“The discussions are on-going and that’s a positive”, he said in an interview. “We think that together, with the review of the Canadian TV system by the CRTC, that these two elements together bode well for resolutions for some of the issues that U.S. broadcasters have with the importation and retransmission of their signals in Canada.”
However, Cartt.ca has obtained a copy of the letter, which is undated and addressed to CRTC secretary general John Traversy and signed by Daniel A. Sepulveda, Ambassador, U.S. Coordinator for International Communications and Information Policy. However, according to a CRTC spokesman on Monday, the letter has not actually been received by the Commission. Cartt.ca has also been unable to independently verify that discussions on this matter are really taking place between the U.S. Department of State and either of the CRTC or the Department of Canadian Heritage.
In an e-mail response to a Cartt.ca request for more details on the bi-lateral discussions, the Department of Canadian Heritage, under whose jurisdiction television matters like this falls, wrote: “The Department of Canadian Heritage has had no bilateral discussions with the U.S. on TV retransmission issues.”
Cartt.ca will continue to examine this unusual, unfolding story.
– Lesley Hunter
