Speeches and Interviews
April 28, 2006
Notes for Remarks by Robert Rabinovitch at the National Symposium of the Law Society of Upper Canada
Notes for Remarks by Robert Rabinovitch, President and Chief Executive Officer, CBC/Radio-Canada, at the National Symposium of the Law Society of Upper Canada and the Media and Communications Law Section of the Canadian Bar Association, Ottawa.
(Please check against delivery)
Thank you and good afternoon.
For the 70 years that CBC/Radio-Canada has been around it has been relatively clear what we mean by broadcasting.
Broadcasting, loosely defined, was the act of sending images and sounds from studios to transmitters and from there to radios and television sets across the country and, eventually, around the world. We assumed that consumers were passive, taking what we broadcast when we put it on the air.
You don't need me to tell you that is no longer the case.
Today audiences navigate almost seamlessly across media, watching television on iPods, watching the Olympics on cellphones, using VoIP to talk to friends overseas, and listening to radio via satellite.
Just look at how CBC/Radio-Canada has evolved over the course of its history. Seventy years ago we were a Radio broadcaster. Today we reach Canadians in English, French and eight Aboriginal languages, on 27 different platforms.
Broadcasting is morphing. The boundaries between its traditional elements and other parts of the media universe are becoming indistinct.
And the cycle of innovation is accelerating.
For many in the broadcasting world, change represents a threat. To us at CBC/Radio-Canada, we recognize that there are challenges ahead, but we also see incredible opportunities.
We're already exploring - with considerable success I would add - some of the opportunities the new broadcasting world presents. CBC.ca and Radio-Canada.ca, for example, are among the top Web sites Canadians go to for up-to-the-minute News and information.
We're also partners in SIRIUS Canada, a satellite radio venture that is currently far exceeding its first-year subscriber targets and is exposing Canadian talent and voices to all of North America.
Through new platforms we're rediscovering old audiences and finding new ones. For example, in the last six months there have been over four million downloads of CBC/Radio-Canada's English and French podcasts.
Who is doing the downloading? People in the 18-34 year old age group - not exactly your typical CBC Radio audience! And what are they downloading? Information, science and entertainment programs like Quirks & Quarks, Vinyl Café, Les Années lumière and Le sport autrement.
These new platforms mean that people who might never find the time to listen in during the day are discovering that they can enjoy our intelligent, distinctive programming when - and where - they want it.
But adapting to new technologies is just part of the answer to the question we have been asked to consider here today: How are public broadcasters adjusting to the changing broadcasting world?
For CBC/Radio-Canada, staying relevant means more than just adapting to new technologies.
It means recognizing that the cultural and demographic makeup of our country is changing, and along with it, the needs and interests of our audiences.
It means changing the way we think about our audiences, our programming and how we develop, commission and broadcast programs.
We need to remember one thing, and that is - even in a world of incredible technological change, content is king and whoever owns the content and can re-purpose it for different platforms will flourish. We no longer think of ourselves as "television producers" or "radio producers". Today, we're content producers.
But in order to succeed we will need to be leaner, to have shorter lines of decision-making, to remove the bureaucracy that inhibits creativity and competitiveness.
We need to open ourselves up to the broader creative community of Canada. We need to be less insular, less satisfied, and we need to move faster.
We need to continue to look for ways of working with private partners - like we do with satellite radio, with Bell Mobility for the Olympics, with Rogers for VOD and some of our specialty channels.
We need to take more risks with our programming and challenge our audiences.
Our English and French Radio services, for instance, have been incredibly successful in part because we have the best programmers and most distinct programming in the country. It takes about three seconds of listening to know when you are tuned to CBC Radio One or Radio-Canada's Première Chaîne, versus a private station.
If you look at CBC Television, however, you see that it has struggled to consistently deliver programs that tell compelling Canadian stories in a way that large numbers of viewers want to watch.
A significant portion of the Canadian television viewing public, including the heaviest users of the television medium, is not currently served by our programming - it's not that they dislike CBC Television or don't value the role it plays. They just don't find programming on the network that is relevant to them.
We know the role of the public broadcaster is distinctly different from, though complementary to, that of the country's private broadcasters.
Despite the growth of new types of media, despite new technologies, despite the fragmentation of audiences, television remains the most pervasive mass medium in the Western world - it is the principal disseminator of culture in society and a powerful vehicle for sharing identity.
Let's take the issue of domestic television drama - programs made by, for and about Canadians and that reflect our unique sensibility. The reason we haven't seen a breakthrough in drama is due largely to cost - more than a million dollars per hour to produce programs that will generate approximately $125,000 in advertising revenues.
If we want Canadian drama to succeed, we need to build a critical mass of homegrown programs. It is not enough to make just one or two good shows; we need to rehabilitate the entire genre. If we want to attract larger audiences, we need to make Canadian drama more accessible by providing it in sufficient quantity; it must be of high enough quality, and we must show it in prime time when people are actually watching television.
And only the public broadcaster has space in its schedule to do that. The economics of Canadian television virtually guarantee that private broadcasters will - and must - continue to simulcast those American programs that attract large audiences.
While we are mandated to provide Canadian programming that informs, enlightens and entertains, we are not precluded from doing it in a way that large numbers of Canadians want to watch or listen to it.
Nor should we be. While audience numbers are just one way of measuring our success and relevance, we are not a public broadcaster if there is no public watching or listening to us.
Let me tell you a story.
In August 2002, Télévision de Radio-Canada had seen a decade of declining viewership; the competition was producing increasingly high-quality, prime-time drama; and people were questioning Radio-Canada's relevance.
We took a few basic, but difficult steps, reducing non-programming budgets and canceling some iconic but failing series to free up cash to invest in daring, broadly appealing, new shows. Then we took big risks and launched successive seasons of new dramatic and entertainment series.
Three years later, Télévision de Radio-Canada's ratings are up, revenues are up, creativity is way up. Our prime-time audience share has moved up from 16.5 in 2002 to 22 per cent in 2005. That's impressive.
Some new shows failed and were quickly taken off the air. But today, instead of attacking us for being irrelevant, our detractors attack us for being too popular.
Our programming must be entertaining and fun as well as intelligent, interesting and engaging. Public service broadcasting is not to be - as the UK Government White Paper on the BBC says - "confined to the ‘worthy'. Indeed, in most cases [a public broadcaster's] output will achieve its maximum impact and its public policy goals only by entertaining its viewers and listeners."
We must play a leading role in new technologies, whether we're making our Olympics programming available for download on cell phones, or making our award-winning science and information programs available via satellite radio or as podcasts.
As our viewers become more active in choosing the time and place for seeing or listening to our content, so too must we adjust and create new programs and content and re-purpose existing ones for new platforms. While we embrace the opportunities the changing world presents, we need more than just our good will and intent. We will also require adequate funding.
It has been more than 30 years since we have received a permanent increase in our Government operating funding beyond the standard Government salary increases.
A recent study of public broadcasting systems in 26 OECD countries found that when you weigh funding in terms of percentage of GDP, Canada places 22nd out of 26 countries surveyed!
If you look at CBC Television, for example, you see that it receives little more than a quarter of the Corporation's total funding - about $275M. The rest of its budget, more than 50 per cent, is derived from commercial operations - advertising, subscription fees, program sales. How can you call yourself a public broadcaster when over 50 per cent of your budget comes from competing with the private sector? The reality is that CBC Television is only partly a public broadcaster. The result is that the commercial pressures that this funding mix creates cannot but have an impact on the kind of programming that we can do.
We've undertaken efforts in the last six years to operate more efficiently and to generate savings and revenues that can be invested in programming. Through efficient management of our resources, we've freed up $102 million in one-time savings, and launched initiatives that are generating $65 million in annual ongoing savings and revenues.
But it's not enough. In addition to changing the way we think and operate, we are going to have to address funding issues, if Canadians are going to have access to Canadian programs.
For instance, we'll have to take a close look at the issue of fee for carriage. Now that primary signal delivery has migrated to satellite, cable and soon Internet delivery, why should these carriers get our signal for free?
The public broadcaster in each country must provide services that are distinctive to the country's needs. In this 500-channel universe, the choice of foreign content is multiplying and will continue to multiply. And this is particularly true in Canada, sitting next to the largest producer of content in the world.
There is a fundamental hole in English television programming in Canada. We must create domestic dramatic television. Only a vibrant national public broadcaster can tackle this initiative.
In a world where technologies change and new platforms constantly emerge, people will stop being television watchers and radio listeners and become content seekers. CBC/Radio-Canada will be the primary source of distinctive Canadian content across all genres.
In the coming months we expect there will be ample opportunity for us to engage our stakeholders - the CRTC, Government, our partners, and the public - in discussions about these very issues. These reviews will receive our full and active support and participation. Hopefully, these reviews will be forward-looking, as we approach the end of television as we know it.
Thank you. I look forward to your questions.
