Federal Election Campaign Begins – Where will federal parties stand on culture issues?

Bul­letin 48/05

Ottawa, Novem­ber 29, 2005 – To the sur­prise of no one, the oppo­si­tion par­ties made good on their
recent threats to defeat Rt. Hon. Paul Martin’s minor­ity gov­ern­ment and have voted in sup­port of a
non-confidence motion. Early signs are that this fed­eral elec­tion will be some­what dif­fer­ent than
Cana­dian elec­tions of the past, as we have already wit­nessed the begin­nings of neg­a­tive cam­paign
tac­tics and name-calling that will likely only heat up over the com­ing weeks.
The chal­lenge for orga­ni­za­tions like the Cana­dian Con­fer­ence of the Arts (CCA) will be to put pub­lic
pol­icy issues for­ward and have each party pro­nounce them­selves on their inten­tions for the arts and
cul­tural sec­tor, if elected. What leg­isla­tive pro­gram are they plan­ning and which are the most
impor­tant pri­or­i­ties for each con­tend­ing party? Will each polit­i­cal party hon­our the finan­cial
com­mit­ment to the Canada Coun­cil for the Arts and other cul­tural insti­tu­tions and fund­ing pro­grams
announced last week? Will the par­ties agree to revisit Canada’s Inter­na­tional Pol­icy which abol­ishes
the Third Pil­lar of for­eign pol­icy, “the pro­mo­tion of Cana­dian cul­ture and val­ues”? How will the
par­ties approach the sub­ject of copy­right reform and will future leg­is­la­tion affirm the rights of
cre­ators?
The CCA will be con­sult­ing with our mem­ber­ship on an on-going basis in the com­ing days and weeks
to deter­mine what items you feel must be a part of any suc­cess­ful party’s elec­tion plat­form. We would
also wel­come your sug­ges­tions by email at any time lcoletta@ccarts.ca. We will keep our mem­ber­ship
informed of how the cul­tural sector’s elec­tion plat­form is shap­ing up and the kind of responses we
receive from party offi­cials.
When the Board of the CCA met in Sep­tem­ber of this year, it approved a Code of Con­duct for the
CCA dur­ing a fed­eral elec­tion cam­paign. This Code spells out the non-partisan nature of the CCA and
how it intends to pre­serve this sta­tus dur­ing an elec­tion cam­paign. It is on our web­site at
www.ccarts.ca/en/about/bog/CodeofConduct.htm.
Finally, if you have any sug­ges­tions as to how to raise the issues of impor­tance to the arts and cul­tural
sec­tor, please share them. If you hear an answer from a can­di­date that makes you sweat or jump for
joy, please let us know. The CCA will be pro­vid­ing cov­er­age of the elec­tion cam­paign and the
treat­ment of cul­tural issues.