FROM THE DESK of Alain Pineau: Update on CCA Activities

CCA Bul­letin 28/09

Decem­ber 1, 2009

 

The past sev­eral weeks have been quite busy here at the Cana­dian Con­fer­ence of the Arts (CCA) and it is about time I bring you up to date on what has been going on, par­tic­u­larly on the advo­cacy front. In this bul­letin, I will dis­cuss the following:

Cre­ation of an all-party Arts Cau­cus on Par­lia­ment Hill

Let us start with the most recent news.  On Novem­ber 25th the CCA was invited to make a pre­sen­ta­tion to Parliament’s ‘All-Party Arts Cau­cus’. An ini­tia­tive of the NDP, the Arts Cau­cus is meant to give oppor­tu­ni­ties for Par­lia­men­tar­i­ans from both the House of Com­mons and the Sen­ate to meet with rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the arts and cul­ture com­mu­ni­ties. The goal is to become bet­ter informed about the real­i­ties of the sec­tor and the chal­lenges it faces, in a non-partisan con­text and out­side of the for­mal processes of Parliament.

This is a wel­come devel­op­ment on the Hill as, unfor­tu­nately, polit­i­cal processes are too often highly par­ti­san. Hear­ings of the Stand­ing Com­mit­tee on Her­itage are often used by MPs to score polit­i­cal points or put long-winded state­ments on the record rather than to ask prob­ing ques­tions of the wit­nesses they have called on to appear at tax­pay­ers’ expense.

Arts Cau­cus mem­bers do not want to dupli­cate the work of exist­ing Par­lia­men­tary Com­mit­tees and some of them were very clear also that they view this as an oppor­tu­nity to get bet­ter acquainted with the cul­tural sec­tor, not to be lob­bied on spe­cific issues. Although, to the extent that bet­ter under­stand­ing should influ­ence decision-making, I would say that the dis­tinc­tion may be dif­fi­cult to sus­tain at times!

The not yet offi­cial list of the Arts Cau­cus includes ten Con­ser­v­a­tives MPs, eigh­teen NDP, six Lib­er­als, and four mem­bers of the Bloc Québé­cois. Three Sen­a­tors have expressed an inter­est, of which two are Lib­er­als and one is a Con­ser­v­a­tive. One can only hope that the list will grow and that atten­dance will remain strong!

The CCA was invited to make the first pre­sen­ta­tion to the Arts Cau­cus and to pro­vide a brief bird’s eye view of the Cana­dian arts and cul­ture sec­tor. I began by intro­duc­ing the Cana­dian Con­fer­ence of the Arts to the Cau­cus and explain the unique role it plays within the cul­tural sec­tor.  Based on sta­tis­tics cur­rently avail­able, I painted the pro­file of the typ­i­cal Cana­dian artist (if such a crea­ture exists!) and empha­sized the impor­tant con­tri­bu­tions that arts make to all facets of Cana­dian soci­ety, from edu­ca­tion and health to com­mu­nity build­ing, pub­lic safety, and diplo­macy. Not­ing that each of these should be the object of a sep­a­rate pre­sen­ta­tion, I used the short time at our dis­posal to focus pri­mar­ily on the con­tri­bu­tion of arts and cul­ture to Canada’s economy.

There is no doubt that this all-party Arts Cau­cus is an impor­tant ini­tia­tive on the part of Par­lia­men­tar­i­ans. I have assured them of the full coop­er­a­tion of the CCA to facil­i­tate their access to the sec­tor, in order to fos­ter open dis­cus­sion and a forum for guests to bet­ter inform our fed­eral decision-makers. I look for­ward to being invited back and hav­ing the time to delve deeper into pol­icy issues and con­cerns of the arts and cul­ture sector.

If your orga­ni­za­tion is inter­ested in mak­ing a pre­sen­ta­tion to the All Party Arts Cau­cus, you can get in touch with the Cau­cus Chair, Ms. Denise Savoie, at (613) 996‑2358, or by Fax: (613) 952‑1458 or Email: SavoiD@parl.gc.ca

The quest for cul­tural sta­tis­tics

Canada once had an envi­able inter­na­tional rep­u­ta­tion when it came to cul­tural sta­tis­tics. The work of Sta­tis­tics Canada used to be referred to by no less than its British coun­ter­part! Unfor­tu­nately, over the past 15 years or so, we have wit­nessed a pro­gres­sive dete­ri­o­ra­tion of the sit­u­a­tion. This dete­ri­o­ra­tion has been the result of sev­eral fac­tors, all hav­ing to do with bud­get deficit fight­ing in the 1990s and suc­ces­sive cuts, the most recent result­ing from last year’s Strate­gic Review exercise.

The Board of the CCA recently decided that the orga­ni­za­tion would seek to reverse that trend as one of its top pri­or­i­ties. As Chair of Sta­tis­tics Canada’s National Advi­sory Com­mit­tee on Cul­tural Sta­tis­tics, I am glad to work closely with offi­cials of both Stats Can and the Depart­ment of Her­itage to ensure that the cul­tural sec­tor and the gov­ern­ment have access to reli­able and timely sta­tis­tics. Sta­tis­tics are essen­tial to the devel­op­ment of this very impor­tant sec­tor of activ­ity within Cana­dian soci­ety and to the eval­u­a­tion of poli­cies and pro­grams put in place to sup­port it.

This is why the CCA has par­tic­i­pated actively in the recent broad­ened con­sul­ta­tion fol­low­ing the review of the Con­cep­tual Frame­work. The Frame­work is designed to estab­lish what will be mea­sured and as such is the very foun­da­tion of the col­lec­tion of data and of sta­tis­ti­cal analy­sis. The recent revi­sion aims at improv­ing the 2004 Frame­work, par­tic­u­larly with regards to new inter­ac­tive media and to crafts.

The CCA never misses an oppor­tu­nity to sen­si­tize our MPs and gov­ern­ment offi­cials of the impor­tance for the gov­ern­ment to invest in the improve­ment of cul­tural sta­tis­tics, a point I raised with the Arts Cau­cus last week and in front of the Stand­ing Com­mit­tee on Finance in Sep­tem­ber. I will keep you informed of future devel­op­ments in this cru­cial but unfor­tu­nately not “polit­i­cally sexy” issue. I would also strongly urge you to under­line the impor­tance of good sta­tis­tics when you meet you local MP or with gov­ern­ment offi­cials when you come to Ottawa.

CCA to the CRTC: If “the mar­ket” will not deliver Cana­dian pro­gram­ming, you are there to make sure it hap­pens by reg­u­lat­ing the sec­tor!

I was in front of the CRTC once again last week in the never end­ing saga of hear­ings on the future of con­ven­tional tele­vi­sion ser­vices. As stated in my pre­sen­ta­tion, this was an oppor­tu­nity for the voice of the arts and cul­ture sec­tor to be heard above the din cre­ated by the unseemly school yard brawl that has erupted between Canada’s major broad­cast­ers and distributors.

CCA’s posi­tion is that it is imper­a­tive to reestab­lish Cana­dian pro­gram­ming expen­di­tures quo­tas (30% of rev­enue) on broad­cast­ers. As for the quar­rel about whether cable and satel­lite oper­a­tors should pay over the air broad­cast­ers for car­ry­ing their sig­nals, as they do for spe­cialty ser­vices and as is done in the USA, the CCA has stated sev­eral times that it sup­ports this approach pro­vided that the money raised is used to pro­duce bet­ter local and national pro­gram­ming, par­tic­u­larly in drama. And given the huge profit mar­gin enjoyed by cable oper­a­tors ($ 2 bil­lion in 2008), the best way to pro­tect con­sumers is to rein­tro­duce reg­u­la­tion for basic cable rates.

CCA’s approach is rooted in the cul­tural objec­tives and reg­u­la­tion mech­a­nisms estab­lished in the Broad­cast­ing Act. How­ever, our advice is being met with strong resis­tance from CRTC Com­mis­sion­ers who argue that reg­u­la­tion is the way of the past and that bring­ing it back would be con­trary to the strong dereg­u­la­tion process started sev­eral years ago. The reply to that, of course, is that Par­lia­ment has empow­ered the Com­mis­sion to reg­u­late when the mar­ket approach will not deliver on the cul­tural objec­tives of the Act, some­thing for which we cur­rently have ample evidence!

I am to reap­pear again next week in front of the Com­mis­sion, when it holds yet another hear­ing, this one on order from the gov­ern­ment, to exam­ine the impact on con­sumers of estab­lish­ing a value for sig­nal (oth­er­wise known as fee for car­riage) for tra­di­tional broad­cast­ers.

The Cul­tural Pol­icy 101 Work­shops

Over the past two months, I have had the oppor­tu­nity to present CCA’s work­shop The Pol­i­tics of Art and the Art of Pol­i­tics to var­i­ous audi­ences in Regina, Peter­bor­ough, Kingston, Water­loo and St. John’s. Due to a bad cold, I had to post­pone my vis­its to Sud­bury and Sault-Ste-Marie until Jan­u­ary. More than fif­teen com­mu­ni­ties and orga­ni­za­tions have already expressed an inter­est in the presentation.

I will be on the road again through­out the spring, which will give me an oppor­tu­nity to meet with cul­tural stake­hold­ers in parts of the coun­try I have not yet been able to visit. If your orga­ni­za­tion is inter­ested in the work­shop, please con­tact Megan Forsythe at (613) 238‑3561, ext. 18 or at megan@ccarts.ca .

And finally, a good piece of news…

Finally I am glad to report that the Min­is­ter of Cana­dian Her­itage, the Hon. James Moore, has renewed CCA’s annual con­tri­bu­tion agree­ment for 2010-11 with a small increase of great sym­bolic value: it is the first such increase since the $ 100 K cut imposed in 2006 by the incom­ing government.

Min­is­ter Moore’s let­ter goes on to say that “in expend­ing these con­tri­bu­tion monies, I am con­fi­dent that you and the Cana­dian Con­fer­ence of the Arts will con­tinue to pro­mote the encour­age­ment and advance­ment of the arts and cul­ture in Canada, help­ing Cana­di­ans to appre­ci­ate the role of the arts and cul­ture in our society.”