OTTAWA – When Cartt.ca wrote about CBC/SRC CRTC licence renewal last month, one of the questions which remained was: How much money will the Corporation be able to draw upon to meet its obligations, and how can the CRTC impose obligations in the absence of budgetary certainty?
It’s not the first time the CRTC and the CBC/SRC found themselves at this junction, but this time there was some guidance from the 2016 Federal Budget.
However, the 2016 Budget used language which created more confusion. “The Minister of Canadian Heritage will work with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation/Radio-Canada to develop a five-year accountability plan. Budget 2016 proposes to invest $675 million in the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation/Radio-Canada to disseminate and support world-class Canadian content and to provide Canadians with better access to programs and services in the digital era,” the 2016 Budget read.
Further down in that Budget, where it talked about “Growing the Middle Class,” it says the CBC would get $75 million on top of its existing Parliamentary appropriation the first year, and then $150 million in each of the next four years.
Most assumed it was a five-year injection of funds that would end in 2021. Friends of Canadian Broadcasting in an editorial, on October 22nd stated: “The Liberals increased CBC funding in 2016, but the increase was temporary. Absent of government action, the CBC will revert to Harper-era funding levels by 2021. The Liberals could have promised to make that funding permanent, but their election platform was conspicuously silent on the question of CBC funding.”
Cartt.ca echoed that notion when we wrote “…if the government does not prolong its five years/$675 million additional commitment that started in Budget 2016.”
At the time of our story on the CBC licence renewal, we were told there was now an assumption was that funding ($150 million) was permanent. However, we were skeptical since it had not been confirmed by the federal government.
So, we decided to clarify and called upon the Canadian Heritage Department. “As the national public broadcaster, CBC/Radio-Canada plays a vital role in providing access to programs and services in the digital era. That is why in Budget 2016 the Government reinvested $675 million in CBC/Radio-Canada over five years,” responded its media relations desk in an email, “and $150 million per year on an ongoing basis. This permanent funding is provided to support investments in enhanced services such as digital Canadian content.”
This means the annual funding level from the Government of Canada to the CBC/SRC has risen to and will remain over $1.2 billion.
