Much at stake at CRTC hearings by Julian Beltrame

The deep fault-lines in Canadian broadcasting will be in full view starting Tuesday as the industry and its regulator gather to determine everything from whether Canadians can get HBO or ESPN, or pay more to watch television. 

The broad scope of public hearings has caused many to fret that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission has put so much on the line it could undo a broadcasting system they say has nurtured a creative domestic industry while delivering an abundance of TV shows from around the world. 

"Over the course of 40 years, the CRTC has built up a web of inter-related rules, regulations and incentives that has given Canadians among the greatest choice in the world, as well as Canadian programming," said Ian Morrison of Friends of Canadian Broadcasting. 

"I'm afraid if the hearings went the wrong way, Canadians could wake up one day and find that they have less a Canadian broadcast system and more an American system." 

With so much at stake, some key players have commissioned public polls, filed hundreds of pages of arguments and even waged a war of words in the media in advance of the three-week CRTC hearings. 

In counter-point articles in a Toronto newspaper last week, Rogers Communications vice-chairman Phil Lind accused CTVglobemedia and CanWest Global Communications of mismanaging their businesses, then crying poor in support of their demand that cable and satellite carriers pay them for signals that are free to anyone with an antennae. 

CTV's executive vice-president Paul Sparkes returned fire by suggesting the cable operators were greedy, saying that not only should they pay about 50 cents per over-the-air station - something that could cost subscribers anywhere from $2 to $10 a month depending on the market - but they should absorb the cost and not pass it on to subscribers. 

Even more contentious is a demand by the cable and satellite providers that the CRTC dismantle part or all the regulations that shelter Canadian specialty channels such as TSN and Sportsnet from competing with the U.S.-based ESPN sports network or The Movie Network from HBO. 

"The possible fight on this would make the Ultimate Fighting Championship fight night look like wholesome family programming," said Kaan Yigit, a technology analyst at Solutions Research Group. 

It could also mean that some of these channels, and particularly smaller independents like the Discovery channel, won't be able to survive, warned Morrison. 

So what! responds the cable and satellite operators. 

"If a Canadian specialty service has no audience it's not entitled to live forever," Lind said in an interview. Lind adds he would not throw out all the rules - so-called genre protection - but would allow any channel from anywhere in the world into Canada that does not lead directly to the bankruptcy of the Canadian equivalent. 

Shaw Cablesystems would go even further. As long as cable and satellite providers offer the basic service and a "preponderance" of Canadian services, there should be no restrictions on non-Canadian channels, the Alberta-based cable TV provider argues. 

"BDUs (cable and satellite distributors) should not be forced to ensure that each customer 'takes' or 'receives' a majority of Canadian services," senior vice-president Ken Stein has written the commission. "The carriage of all Canadian and non-Canadian services should be determined in the marketplace". 

Lind said cable operators need the changes to adapt to the challenge of new technology and that the old rules don't make any sense anymore. 

With more and more shows available on the Internet and other platforms, not to mention black market satellite dishes, Canadians will find a way to watch the shows they want, when they want, regardless of what the CRTC has to say about it, he said. And that will mean fewer and fewer Canadians will subscribe to cable and legal satellite TV services such as BCE's BellExpressVu and Shaws StarChoice. 

"These rules were put in place in the '70s and '80s, but we're in a different environment now," Lind said. "We want to keep the system Canadian, but we also have to change the rules and open it up."

© St. Catharines Standard