John Ralston Saul
Culture and Foreign Policy
Republished with permission
This is an area in which we produce a great deal of drama and entertainment, much of which is being exported. But as in all areas of culture the secret is that you must produce a great deal of material at all levels - from the most commercial to the most esoteric - in order to produce a balanced image of your culture and a healthy industry. In accomplishing this we are handicapped not by the creative side, but by an internal structural anomaly. That is, we are subject to the foreign policy of others to an unacceptable degree. In this case there is no real excuse because we have the regulatory mechanism in place. It simply doesn't do its job.
a) CRTC
The CRTC has the regulatory power to create a perfectly healthy broadcasting image and industry in Canada. For inexplicable reasons it refuses to act except in marginal ways.
Only 4% of the drama and entertainment on all available television in English is Canadian. That is the direct result of CRTC decisions. They effectively regulate Canadian content off the air.
Attention is usually focused the other way around. Why, for example, is there still some American broadcasting on CBC? That there isn't much and that it is gradually going is ignored while the central questions remain in the background.
Why is CTV renewed at some 4 hours a week of Canadian Drama and entertainment, much of it in off-hours; and Global with less? The programming which CTV and Global do not make is the programming which we do not have to sell abroad.
They complain that they can't afford more. This is nonsense. And if they can only make money by importing programming then their licence shouldn't be renewed and others should be given an opportunity to do better. It must be remembered that the regulators' job is not to lose sleep over the broadcasters' profits but to ensure that they serve the public. The public already receives American broadcasting on American channels. We don't need Canadian networks to duplicate this. Their job is to provide Canadian broadcasting. That is, their job is to provide us with an alternative. There is no reason why CTV should not now be regulated at 8 hours a week in prime time full network.
The point which is constantly missed is that Canadian private broadcasting is a drain on the Canadian economy. What they do produce here is often of quality. But what they don't produce here does not create wealth here. And what they import must be paid for by sending Canadian currency abroad.
b) Cable
The most mysterious aspect of the CRTC's failure to do its job is that of the cable industry. We are the most cabled country in the world; this is literally a money-printing business; and yet the CRTC has created no serious cultural obligations for cable networks.
There are four key companies. VideoTron in French seems to play at least a minimum role as a good corporate citizen. However the three dominant English-language groups do not.
They have 60% of the English-language market. As already pointed out they deliver 96% foreign drama and entertainment. All of this feeds their balance sheets but drains the Canadian economy. After all, a slice of each viewer's cable fee must be sent out of the country to pay for the rights on this 96%. Approximately $65 million out of Canadian subscribers' fees leaves Canada for the United States every year, along with a further $90 million in advertising.
And in addition to virtually shutting Canadian culture off the air, they put almost nothing back in. That is, they do not play their role as corporate citizens.
Recently they have attempted to deflect criticism by creating a $60 million production fund. Three points should be noted.
This is a voluntary fund, offered almost in the spirit of charity. it should simply be a matter of clear regulation so that it can be properly assessed.
$6Q million represents 5% of their net revenue. Canadian broadcasters spend 33% of their net revenue on independent Canadian programming. In other words, the cable fund is peanuts to them. It needs to be much larger.
Given the cable industry's attitudes towards culture, this fund should be set up independently of them, so that it can be run on professional standards.
The key point here is that one ot the things the production industry needs is capital. Ours is neither a small nor a poor market. It is a very rich medium-sized market. But it is structured so that sufficient funds are not made available to feed the growth of the industry. That money lies in good part in the cable system. It's up to the CRTC to ensure that it is used.
This blanketing of Canada with foreign broadcasting is an important foreign policy question because it represents the effects of another country's foreign policy on us. How are Canadians to have a reasonably clear picture of themselves, which they can carry abroad, when they are denied a picture of themselves at home?
Under current regulations the structure - that is, the distribution machine - benefits greatly from the Canadian market-place, but there is no fall-out for the content - that is, for Canadian culture. The question is not whether the cable industry should have the right to print money. The question is why don't we get anything back for having given them this privilege?
One of the most important questions the government must ask itself is not so much why the cable industry fails to deliver acceptable levels of Canadian broadcasting. It is why the CRTC, which is empowered to provide Canadians with an adequate, balanced service, refuses to do so. And what must be done to the CRTC to make it do what it is already perfectly capable ot doing.
c) International Sales
One of the most positive developments from the export point of view is that new technology satellites and the spread of cable - is opening up the international market for Canadian television production. This is something that we must aggressively take advantage of.
The first step in this direction has been taken by a CBC-Power Corporation joint effort in a company called Northbridge. It is placing two Canadian channels on an American satellite broadcasting into the United States. These two channels (TRIO and Newsworld International) will be joined by MuchMusic. TRIO will be carrying 9˜95% Canadian broadcasting. Approximately a quarter will be from CBC. The private broadcasters will also be represented.
Until now, we have always had to sell programs individually. The one who benefited most was the foreign broadcaster. With this new system we can deliver integrated programming.
This is a beginning and it is only aimed at the United States. Again we must not be over-obsessed by this market. There are large markets around the world. Europe, with growing cablization, offers real options. While we are going into the United States, the Americans are going into Europe and Asia.
Particularly on the Newsworld front, we have substantial advantages over CNN, BBC and other broadcasters from countries which are often thought of as colonial or ax-colonial powers with a point ot view to sell. Broadcasters are now scrambling around the world, looking for partners ftor their regions.
We must put ourselves in the forefront of this market. There is a great deal the federal government and, in particular, Foreign Affairs can do to co-ordinate an international strategy with
Canadian broadcasters and to set about opening up markets for our products. As in Canada, this is a regulatory matter and it takes co-ordinated efforts for space to be opened up on cable systems and partnerships to be formed for satellite efforts.
d) Sales Agency
As in other cultural sectors there may be a real advantage in the creation of a commercial-sales agency which represents Canadian broadcasters abroad. This need not be an exclusive operation but, in most areas, including film and TV, sales are aided by the size of the agency. The more they have to sell and the greater the variety of the programs they offer, the more clout they have with foreign broadcasters.
An agency such as this would, of course, work on a purely commercial-fee percentage.
John Ralston Saul is an essayist and novelist. He is the author of many books, including The Doubter's Companion - A Dictionary of Aggressive Common Sense, Voltaire's Bastards: the Dictatorship of Reason in the West, and Paradise Eater, which won the Premio Letterario Internazionale in 1990. Mr. Saul has a Ph.D. from King's College, London.
