Can-con continues decline by Graham Fraser
Source : Toronto Star
Oct 24, 2001
by Graham Fraser
OTTAWA - Despite millions of federal dollars provided to private broadcasters for Canadian programming, private TV networks are spending steadily more on U.S. television programs and less on Canadian ones.
A recent study by Friends of Canadian Broadcasting found that the country's private conventional broadcasters, such as CTV and Global, increased their spending on non-Canadian programs between 1993-94 and 1999-2000 by more than 50 per cent, while they reduced their spending on Canadian programs by 6 per cent.
"During the same period, their revenues, in year 2001 dollars, increased by almost 14 per cent, and their profits rose by 42 per cent," the study found.
"The amount of public money has doubled, yet the private networks are spending less," Ian Morrison, spokesperson for the Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, said in an interview yesterday. "That's a problem."
The study has been submitted to the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage, which begins hearings on the future of Canadian broadcasting on Nov. 4.
The study found that over the decade from 1989-90 to 1999-2000, federal contributions to Canadian television production funds more than doubled from $102.3 million in 2001 dollars to $239.9 million. But over the same period, private broadcasters increased spending on non-Canadian programs from $292.6 million to $449.5 million while spending on Canadian programs dropped from $539 million to $506.1 million.
"But broadcasters do not invest equally," the study observed, pointing out 57 per cent of CTV's total program expenditures - $159.3 million - went to Canadian programs, compared with 41 percent of CanWest Global's spending on Canadian programs.
Friends of Canadian Broadcasting is a lobby group for Canadian content.
Morrison said people are unaware the increased federal funding for Canadian programming has had this perverse effect. "If the government's putting in money, the other players have to belly up to the bar. But it's a one-way street: the government is putting in, and the private conventional broadcasters are taking out."
During the last decade, despite the fact its government funding has been slashed from $1.28 billion annually in 1990-91 to $901 million in 2000-01, the CBC has become almost entirely Canadian.
During the same period, the study shows specialty TV channels have had an impact on the patterns of spending on Canadian programs.
While the CBC is still the largest investor in English-language TV productions assisted by Telefilm Canada, the second-largest investor is now, as a group, the specialty channels, followed by CTV, while Global barely figures in the data.
The study also found CBC-TV is increasingly dependent on advertising revenue from the private sector, which increased from $288.3 million, or 28 per cent of the operating grant in 1995-96, to $353.9 million, or 43.6 per cent in 2000-01.
