GATINEAU – The Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) questioned the appropriateness of the proposed OMNI Regional service in its appearance on Tuesday. Fairchild Television Ltd. noted that it believes a licence renewal hearing isn’t the appropriate forum to consider a new OMNI.
PIAC said the new OMNI doesn’t meets the high bar required for 9(1)(h) carriage. The association said Rogers’ failed to offer a long-term vision for the station indicating how it “would make an exceptional contribution to Canadian expression. Instead, many of its commitments already reflect existing or past conditions of licence and programming.”
That Rogers is attempting to get OMNI licensed as a specialty channel with 9(1)(h) carriage in this hearing is inappropriate and raises issues of procedural fairness, Fairchild argued. The company said Rogers should be pursuing OMNI Regional through a separate, dedicated proceeding.
While the company didn’t come out dead set against the OMNI Regional service, it noted the application is “novel, precedent setting” and unfair “to ethnic broadcasters.”
“In Fairchild’s respectful view such an application should only be heard in a dedicated CRTC proceeding which is transparent open to all interested parties and properly framed and communicated to the public by the Commission for the very purpose,” said Connie Sephton, director of corporate affairs at Fairchild.
The company urged the Commission, if it’s open to considering 9(1)(h) status for a multilingual channel, to hear from multiple applicants with the goal of licensing “the best and most innovative proposal.”
Other intervenors, including Rogers’ fellow VI companies and other carriers had rather little to say on the proposal, leading CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais to suggest to Telus that they weren’t opposed to the idea of a new 9(1)(h) or at least “not prepared to die” on this particular hill.
