p2pnet news view Politics | TV:- “Canadian federal Heritage Minister James Moore has launched the Canadian Media Fund, which will combine the Canadian Television Fund (CTF) and the Canada New Media Fund beginning by April 1, 2010,” said p2pnet yesterday.

For Canadians, “it means more choice, more content and better support for the future of digital entertainment and content,” said Moore, quoted in the Montreal Gazette.

But the Documentary Organization of Canada / l’association des Documentaristes du Canada (DOC) is less than ecstatic over the news.

That “five Canadian cable companies have been given control of nearly 300 million dollars in public funds contributed by Canadians to support Canadian television production” is cause for serious concern, says the organisation, going on it’s worried by the “negative impact of the proposed new fund  on Canadian independent production and Canadian documentaries in particular”.

The funds include $134.7 million from Canadian Heritage and a similar amount collected from cable subscribers by order of the CRTC.

DOC, a non-profit, cross-Canada association representing more than 850 directors, producers and crafts-people in the documentary community, points out the cable  companies  argue special levies  they  collect  from  Canadians  are  “theirs,”  and  that  they should  have  the  ability  to  influence  the  content  of  programs produced  and  to  spend  the  money  on  their  own  in-house productions.

“This  would  give  them  full  control  over  content, copyright and distribution of Canadian programming paid for by public funds,” says the DOCA, citing areas for concern as  »»»

• Poor  governance  and  no  accountability:  Despite  the fact  that  the  Canadian  public  and  not  the  cable  companiescontribute  to  the  fund,  the  controlling majority  (5  out  of  7)  of the  proposed  board  would  be  nominated  by  the  cable companies. With no balance of power and no effective oversight, the cable companies will be accountable only to themselves.
• Direct  conflict  of  interest:  By  controlling  the  board, cable  companies  will  effectively  create  the  rules  for  access  to the  fund. As  they  themselves  control and own a  large majority of broadcasters, they are in direct position to financially benefit, to the exclusion of others, from the Canadian Media Fund.  
• Elimination of transparency and fairness:  As broadcaster envelopes are eliminated, the CMF will need to return to a subjective point system for making funding choices. Through their control of the funds board, cable companies will be in a position to effectively decide on the type of content allowed.
• Documentaries could be shut out of the fund: In the proposed CMF, documentaries are no longer listed as a priority and will be subject to a stringent “test” not demanded from fiction programming. Through the previous fund, documentaries were recognized as an under-represented genre and received almost 20% of the funds – translating into about  40% of all programming hours produced. But as genre allocations are revised,  documentaries may be financially pushed to the sidelines. 
• Endangering Independent Production companies:  Independent producers provide the bulk of the programming for Canadian television. As such they are the major employer of Canadian talent and craftspeople. But under the CMF they will get no representation on the board nor fair access to the funds.  By having independent producers directly compete for the funds with broadcasters and cable companies, the playing field will become anything but level. In these trying economic times we can ill afford disadvantaging an entire independent business sector for the benefit of Canada’s largest media companies who operate in a protected environment. 

“Before the CMF is launched in 2010 the Minister has promised broad consultation with the industry,”" says the DOCA, adding:

“The issues raised by DOC and others need to be addressed and representation on the Board of the CMF must be revised to ensure balance, transparency and fairness in the management of this key  cultural fund.”  Is

p2pnet – Digital entertainment: ‘more choice, more content’, March 10, 2009
Montreal Gazette – Fixes proposed for controversial TV fund, March 9, 2009

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 11th, 2009 at 12:03 pm and is filed under Politics, TV. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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