OTTAWA – Rogers Media wants to reduce its Canadian content and cut in half its programming commitments for ethnic groups and distinct languages for its group of OMNI stations. The company will appear before the CRTC next week to defend these and other proposed changes to its conditions of licence (COLs).
The programming changes appear to be quite significant. Rather than meeting the requirement to broadcast programs to 20 different ethnic groups and in 20 distinct languages, Rogers is requesting these be cut in half to 10 in both cases. As well, the company wants to decrease its Canadian programming commitments from not less than 60% of the time between 6 a.m. and midnight and not less than 50% between 6 p.m. and midnight to not less than 40% in both instances.
Rogers argues in its application that the broadcast environment, particularly the ethnic television market, has experienced significant downward pressure since OMNI’s last licence renewal in 2009. This has resulted from changed viewing patterns, lower local advertising and the reduced value attributed to U.S. strip content, all of which have made it increasingly difficult to produce high quality Canadian, ethnic and third language programming.
Competitive pressures affecting OMNI’s ability to operate in the market are the result of four factors. First the U.S. strip model (the reruns of shows like 30 Rock and Two and a Half Men OMNI airs between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m.)has weakened over time because of the increasing availability of this type of content from a number of Canadian and non-Canadian regulated and unregulated services.
Increased competition from English-language services such as CTV Two in Barrie with its original and U.S. strip programming has also affected the ability of OMNI.1 and OMNI.2 – the services that have historically funded other stations in the group – to attract advertising. Overall, OMNI has suffered considerable advertising setbacks with drops of 16% in 2011-2012 and 29% in 2012-2013.
Ethnic specialties are also negatively affecting the OMNI stations, says Rogers, noting that they have the ability to “heavily discount their local advertising rates” as a result of a business model that generates revenue from subscription fees as well as advertising.
The last element, according to Rogers, is that new Canadians are turning away from TV as their primary medium to integrate into society. More and more they are using high-speed Internet connections to access third-language programming from many places around the world.
“These trends underscore the serious competition OMNI faces from both regulated and unregulated sources for ethnic audiences and advertising revenues." – Rogers Media
According to a study from Strategic Inc., submitted as part of Rogers’ evidence, the Internet is the primary source of third-language news and information programming on a local, national and international level for new Canadians. In addition, tuning into TV by new Canadians is below the national average.
“These trends underscore the serious competition OMNI faces from both regulated and unregulated sources for ethnic audiences and advertising revenues. With the rapid pace of change in consumer behaviour and programming interests, OMNI requires the regulatory flexibility to adjust its programming to pursue the revenue needed to support current levels of in-house production in news and information programming,” Rogers says in its application.
The company argues that the Commission has historically treated conventional ethnic stations differently than their English and French language counterparts. Therefore, the company says, it’s not out of the question to request these changes.
“A one-size-fits-all approach is unreasonable,” reads Rogers application. “Accordingly, certain amendments to the standard COLs for conventional television stations are warranted for our OMNI stations if the commission intends to apply the standard COLs to Rogers’ conventional, ethnic television programming undertakings.”
OMNI is also requesting changes to its described video (DV) requirements. Rather than a formula that sees the company increase the amount of hours of DV over the course of a six year term (increasing from two hours to three and then four per month), Rogers would like to see the number of DV hours per month fixed at four.
On closed captioning for both programming and advertising, the company says it simply isn’t economically feasible to adhere to them. Specifically, while the company can commit to 100% closed captioning of English language programming and national English language advertising, it can’t caption local advertising in ethnic and third-language programming.
This, says Rogers, “will create yet another disincentive to advertise on the station.”
The hearing begins on April 8.
