Cultural Policy

Okay, I haven't been on this one for a while, but with new major political news to write on my other blog, I thought I would write on the next topic although not exactly timely. The only thing here is it might show I am not a hardcore Liberal, but rather a soft Liberal who supports the party on many issues, but also disagrees with them on many.

CBC

As mentioned earlier, I generally don't believe the state should be in the business of running business at the same time, almost every developed country has a public broadcaster. I would support making it a private non-profit corporation where the board would be appointed by members of the Canadian public who choose to purchase a $10 membership, rather than by the PM. At the very least in the interim they should be appointed by an all party committee, not the PM so that CBC can remain objective and not appear biased towards one party, even if they aren't. The CBC would be free to show what they wished provided they meet three conditions
1. Provide service to all communities across Canada.
2. Provide service in English, French, and Aboriginal languages wherever a noticeable minority from that community exists or they are the majority.
3. Maintain a minimum of 60% Canadian content and also at least half of that must be Canadian shows that no private sector company will show.

The CBC would continue to get government subsidies.

CRTC

The CRTC does have a role, but it still continues to operate in a 1968 world, rather than 2007 world. The rule that says you can only have one speciality channel of any type should be dropped and instead allow more competition including more foreign channels. The minimum amount of Canadian channels required would continue to exist, but those who wish to access HBO, ESPN, and MTV should be able to do so. Since Canada prides itself in being multicultural, we should drop all restrictions on allowing stations in neither English or French to be broadcast so that our cultural communities can continue to maintain ties to their homeland. In terms of satellites, it should remain illegal to sell grey satellites in Canada, but not illegal to purchase or import them. Instead those importing them would pay a tariff, which would go to fund Canadian culture. Canadian content quotas on television should remain since due to economies of scale, we likely wouldn't have many Canadian shows without the quotas, but Canadian content quotas on radio should be repealed, since while they were necessary in 1968, we have enough homegrown talent such as Celine Dion, Bryan Adams, Shania Twain etc., that we can continue to see Canadian artists succeed both at home and abroad. I believe Canadian content quotas should be used as an infant industry argument in economic terms, which is where the government offers assistance to the industry until it is well established and can compete, but not beyond that. Canadian musical industry is no longer an infant industry, whereas Canadian television still is.

Foreign Ownership

I support lifting foreign ownership restrictions on cable and telecommunications as recommended by the Industry committee in 2003, but keeping them on the media as recommended by the Heritage committee in 2003. I'll leave telecommunications for another section, but on cable, I don't think it really matters who owns the cable lines in a more competitive market, so long as they are bound by all Canadian laws, which all foreign companies wishing to do business in Canada are. I essentially agree with just about everything written in the majority report here. At the same time I do think it is important Canadians have a place to hear things from their perspective. I have no problem with American channels like CNN being available, I just think Canadians should have an area to hear things from their perspective. I should note I almost always only watch the Canadian news.

My next topic will be on foreign policy and security, which is quite relevant today and is an area I am slightly to the left of the Liberals.