Photo: The Canadian Press
The online streaming bill will generate at least $ 1 billion a year for Canada’s creative sector, including Indigenous programs, Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez told a committee of deputies on Monday.
Rodriguez revealed the figure to the House of Commons Heritage Committee, which is studying a bill to update broadcasting laws and apply them to streaming services such as Netflix and Disney Plus.
Rodriguez said some of the money would go to support productions by indigenous and minority communities, as well as French productions from Quebec.
The Department of Heritage originally said that the online streaming bill would generate about $ 830 million a year by making streaming services fund Canadian creative work, as traditional broadcasters do.
Rodriguez said the amount would exceed $ 1 billion because, since his department did its original calculation, more people have subscribed to streaming platforms, such as Netflix.
More platforms, including Disney Plus, have also arrived in Canada and have become increasingly popular during the COVID-19 pandemic.
He said some of the funds would support a variety of programming, including in French.
“We want to be able to hear more diverse voices. We want to hear more indigenous voices. Maybe we can do it with a mandatory provision. Maybe we can find other ways to do it, and looking at the official languages as well, and maybe other languages,” he said.
“The money will go to these goals and will be more than a billion dollars a year.”
The minister said “strengthening the provisions to help Indigenous peoples and racialized Canadians” in the bill was one of the “big ideas” he had heard discussed in committee.
Deputies felt that the bill would also be a responsibility on some platforms to carry channels such as OutTV, which projects LBGTQ programs and movies.
At a previous committee hearing, OutTV said some of the major foreign streaming platforms had refused to broadcast the channel and told them there would be no lawsuit, which OutTV disputed.
Peter Julian, the NDP’s wealth critic, who highlighted the OutTV issue on the committee, said the $ 1 billion a year was a “significant sum.”
Conservative committee member Kevin Waugh expressed surprise that it was so large and asked for more details on how it had been calculated.
Thomas Owen Ripley, Associate Deputy Minister of Canadian Heritage, said some of the $ 1 billion could be used to support Canadian productions, such as dramas, documentaries and children’s programs.
Ripley said “just over $ 900 million a year” would come from the bill’s “spending requirements” for streaming platforms like Netflix to spend a certain percentage of its revenue on Canadian productions, as broadcasters do now. traditional.
He said traditional Canadian broadcasters currently spend just under $ 3 billion a year on Canadian programs, which include news.
Ripley said Netflix already has a “large amount of production activity” in Canada, but “most would not currently qualify as Canadian programs,” according to the current definition.
“Part of the push for this bill is to get them to do more for the Canadian side,” Ripley said, including involving more “Canadian creatives” and telling “more Canadian stories.”
Rodriguez said he would ask the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), the country’s broadcasting regulator, to modernize the definition of what would be described as Canadian content, including a film or television program. after the passage of the bill.
The minister, in often tense exchanges with Conservative MPs, reiterated his claim that the online streaming bill will not affect people who upload videos to YouTube.
Rodriguez said the CRTC had no “zero” interest in regulating the publications of millions of people.
The minister said the bill would not cover user-generated content and would only cover commercial material. When the bill was introduced, Rodriguez said it could include a professional video played on Spotify that also appears on YouTube.
Rodriguez faced persistent questions from Conservative MPs about the definition of “commercial” content with Lethbridge MP Rachael Thomas, repeatedly demanding that she put a figure in it.
“What is the income threshold? Who enters, who leaves?” he asked, accusing the minister of not answering her questions.
Rodriguez’s appearance is second on the committee. Last week, he was forced to leave before being given a chance to speak while Conservative and Liberal lawmakers debated procedural issues, accusing each other of delayed tactics.