TORONTO – Despite losing a huge chunk of its annual budget, the Canadian Television Fund will continue to support all eligible productions for the 2006-07 year, it announced late Wednesday.
At a recent emergency CTF board meeting, it approved a financial plan that will let the fund maintain financial support of all eligible productions for the remainder of fiscal 2006-07.
“The CTF is extremely concerned about our clients and Canadian productions. The board understands that a dramatic reduction in CTF funding so late in the fiscal year would have severely impacted the entire production industry,” says Douglas Barrett, chairman of the CTF board.
The financial plan, which calls for borrowing forward against 07-08 revenues, will however result in an operational deficit for the current fiscal year, which in turn will need to be recovered from the CTF 2007-08 budgets.
“Minister Oda’s critical announcement renewing support to the CTF was welcomed and appreciated news and the CTF thanks the Minister and Government of Canada,” says Valerie Creighton, CTF President. “It permits the CTF to better plan for 2007-08. However, if the current situation is not resolved, the CTF must anticipate a significant reduction in the CTF 2007-2008 budget and program allocations.”
