ACTRA’s campaign for Our TV will reach its zenith in April as Canada’s private broadcasters appear before their regulator, the CRTC, in the hopes of having their licences renewed. These important hearings will determine how much Canadian content we have on our screens for the next seven years. ACTRA will be in the room to make sure broadcasters have to do their part to help create Canadian programming and put more drama on our screens.
These hearings mark the turning point in our campaign for Canadian drama. It was 12 years ago, in 1999, that the CRTC’s disastrous Television Policy relaxed the rules for private broadcasters. As a result, we’ve seen Canadian scripted drama and comedy replace drop off our schedules to be replaced by more and more American and reality- programming.
ACTRA worked hard to make the CRTC see that there was a problem, and they did. Last year, the CRTC released a new TV policy that requires broadcasters to spend a set percentage of their revenues on Canadian programming and commit revenues specifically to producing Canadian drama – just like we had asked for.
At the licence hearings this spring is where these new rules will come into play and details will be ironed out.
The biggest ‘detail’ is just how much broadcasters need to spend on Canadian programming. The last thing we want is for the new policy to take us backwards; broadcasters have not been investing enough into Canadian programming in recent years, they need to do better.
ACTRA is therefore asking that broadcast groups be required to spend 30% of their revenues on Canadian programming, and 10% specifically to ‘programs of national interest (drama, documentaries, award shows). We’ve analyzed their past spending and these amounts are fair and reasonable.
Canadian have a right to see their experiences and culture reflected back to them on the most influential and pervasive cultural medium, television.
Stay tuned to actra.ca for updates, and in the meantime if you would like to read our full submission to the CRTC, click here.
