Heritage minister Pascale St-Onge believes the role of public broadcasting needs to be redefined before the next election, citing fears the Conservatives will leave “arts and culture” to the “free market.” Conservative opposition leader Pierre Poilievre has said if elected prime minister, he will defund the CBC because of its high and unnecessary cost to taxpayers. Poilievre has said media should not be funded by the government, to allow free market access to information — and the money should instead go to “affordable housing.”Earlier in December, major cuts were announced at CBC, eliminating about 600 jobs and abandoning 200 vacancies due to a $125-million budget shortfall despite nearly $1.3 billion from government funding in the 2022-2023 fiscal year.With the new Bill C-18 Online News Act, CBC is eligible for $7 million more after Ottawa brokered a deal with Google. “But there is still uncertainty until the next federal budget," St-Onge told The Canadian Press in a year-end interview. She said she and Justin Trudeau's Liberal government intend to “work with Canadians” to deliver an “independent and free media” through the CBC — and they “really want to achieve that before the next election, to make sure that our public broadcaster is (as) well-positioned as possible for the future.”“I think it's time we do it now because the Liberal party comes from the perspective that we do need a strong public broadcaster, and we will continue to support it," St-Onge said.The Conservatives “have shown they think that the arts and cultural sector should be left to the free market," she continued. "And we know that with foreign companies and foreign entities that take so much space online, and in Hollywood and in San Francisco, it means that we would basically abandon our cultural sector in Canada.”Notably no party is pushing for the defunding of French-language news CBC sister broadcaster Radio Canada, a point St-Onge fixated on. “The public broadcaster is something that's available from coast to coast to coast, and I don't see how Canadians would accept we only fund CBC/Radio-Canada in Quebec or French communities," she said. "I was at Radio-Canada not too long ago for the recording of a show, and you can feel how this is impacting employees' morale."“There's a lot of uncertainty and unpredictability. People weren't informed exactly how and if those cuts do happen, how it will be done and achieved. So it's a difficult time.”One mandate the heritage minister has is arranging a committee to appoint a new head of CBC to replace current CEO Catherine Tait, who is signed on until 2025 but has faced backlash for keeping millions in bonuses for CBC executives while simultaneously laying off hundreds of employees. Conservative heritage critic Rachael Thomas disputes the Liberals’ claims. "Canadians need an independent and free media, not a biased broadcaster that receives a billion taxpayer dollars every year to act as mouthpiece for the Liberal government," Thomas said in a statement, per CTV.
Heritage minister Pascale St-Onge believes the role of public broadcasting needs to be redefined before the next election, citing fears the Conservatives will leave “arts and culture” to the “free market.” Conservative opposition leader Pierre Poilievre has said if elected prime minister, he will defund the CBC because of its high and unnecessary cost to taxpayers. Poilievre has said media should not be funded by the government, to allow free market access to information — and the money should instead go to “affordable housing.”Earlier in December, major cuts were announced at CBC, eliminating about 600 jobs and abandoning 200 vacancies due to a $125-million budget shortfall despite nearly $1.3 billion from government funding in the 2022-2023 fiscal year.With the new Bill C-18 Online News Act, CBC is eligible for $7 million more after Ottawa brokered a deal with Google. “But there is still uncertainty until the next federal budget," St-Onge told The Canadian Press in a year-end interview. She said she and Justin Trudeau's Liberal government intend to “work with Canadians” to deliver an “independent and free media” through the CBC — and they “really want to achieve that before the next election, to make sure that our public broadcaster is (as) well-positioned as possible for the future.”“I think it's time we do it now because the Liberal party comes from the perspective that we do need a strong public broadcaster, and we will continue to support it," St-Onge said.The Conservatives “have shown they think that the arts and cultural sector should be left to the free market," she continued. "And we know that with foreign companies and foreign entities that take so much space online, and in Hollywood and in San Francisco, it means that we would basically abandon our cultural sector in Canada.”Notably no party is pushing for the defunding of French-language news CBC sister broadcaster Radio Canada, a point St-Onge fixated on. “The public broadcaster is something that's available from coast to coast to coast, and I don't see how Canadians would accept we only fund CBC/Radio-Canada in Quebec or French communities," she said. "I was at Radio-Canada not too long ago for the recording of a show, and you can feel how this is impacting employees' morale."“There's a lot of uncertainty and unpredictability. People weren't informed exactly how and if those cuts do happen, how it will be done and achieved. So it's a difficult time.”One mandate the heritage minister has is arranging a committee to appoint a new head of CBC to replace current CEO Catherine Tait, who is signed on until 2025 but has faced backlash for keeping millions in bonuses for CBC executives while simultaneously laying off hundreds of employees. Conservative heritage critic Rachael Thomas disputes the Liberals’ claims. "Canadians need an independent and free media, not a biased broadcaster that receives a billion taxpayer dollars every year to act as mouthpiece for the Liberal government," Thomas said in a statement, per CTV.
