NEW INTERNATIONAL CULTURAL INSTRUMENT GETS A THUMBS UP IN THRONE SPEECH

Ottawa, Feb­ru­ary 2, 2004 – A new ses­sion of gov­ern­ment was ush­ered in today, under the guid­ance of Prime Min­is­ter Paul Mar­tin.  The Speech from the Throne, read by Gov­er­nor Gen­eral Adri­enne Clark­son, painted the gen­eral vision for the next ses­sion in broad strokes (restor­ing trust and account­abil­ity, strength­en­ing Canada’s social foun­da­tions, build­ing a 21^st cen­tury econ­omy) but pro­vided few details as to how these goals would be achieved, par­tic­u­larly as they related to culture.

Over­rid­ing state­ments in the intro­duc­tion sounded good:

“Our his­tory has pre­pared us to be inno­v­a­tive in the mod­ern world, where diver­sity counts for so much.…  When we look around us at Canada today, we see many strengths, many achieve­ments — a soci­ety with an envi­able qual­ity of life and so much poten­tial, so much talent.”

How­ever, one must not for­get the fact that this “Gov­ern­ment is launch­ing an ongo­ing process of expen­di­ture review” which will colour all deci­sions made by gov­ern­ment depart­ments in the future.

CCA is extremely encour­aged by the government’s con­tin­ued com­mit­ment to the work of the INCD and the cul­tural sec­tor, as expressed under the rubric “Canada’s Role in the World”.

“The Gov­ern­ment will con­tinue its lead­er­ship in the cre­ation of a new inter­na­tional instru­ment on cul­tural diver­sity, par­tic­i­pate actively in la Fran­coph­o­nie, and pro­mote and dis­sem­i­nate our cul­tural prod­ucts and works around the world.”

Cul­ture — Canada’s artists and cul­tural enter­prises — received a men­tion under the head­ing “Great Places to Live — A New Deal for Com­mu­ni­ties”.  The Throne Speech stated:

“To this end, the gov­ern­ment of Canada is com­mit­ted to a new deal for Canada’s munic­i­pal­i­ties.…  A new deal that tar­gets the infra­struc­ture needed to sup­port the qual­ity of life and sus­tain­able growth.…  A new deal that helps our com­mu­ni­ties become more dynamic, more cul­tur­ally rich, more cohe­sive, and part­ners in strength­en­ing Canada’s social foun­da­tions.…   A new deal that deliv­ers reli­able, pre­dictable and long-term funding.…

Another defin­ing char­ac­ter­is­tic of our com­mu­ni­ties and of our rep­u­ta­tion around the world is the vital­ity and excel­lence of our cul­tural life.  Canada’s artists and cul­tural enter­prises are among our best ambas­sadors, as well as being an increas­ingly dynamic ele­ment of the knowl­edge econ­omy.  Their work holds a mir­ror on our soci­ety and builds a legacy for future generations.

The Gov­ern­ment will work with par­lia­men­tar­i­ans to mod­ern­ize our arts and cul­ture poli­cies and fed­eral cul­tural insti­tu­tions to bring to bear the new tech­no­log­i­cal pos­si­bil­i­ties of the dig­i­tal age and to reflect Canada’s regional diver­sity and multiculturalism.”

The CCA is also opti­mistic about the phrase “reli­able, pre­dictable and long-term fund­ing” ; this could mean a sig­nif­i­cant renewal of the Tomor­row Starts Today ini­tia­tive.  The state­ment on the arts and cul­ture is strong; how­ever, there is lit­tle sub­stance in the fol­low­ing para­graph to pro­vide com­fort.  There is a real need at the most basic level for improved fund­ing to assist artists, cre­ators and cul­tural work­ers, and to pro­vide capac­ity build­ing and sus­tain­abil­ity for the orga­ni­za­tions which sup­port them.  Pro­vid­ing fund­ing for “new tech­no­log­i­cal pos­si­bil­i­ties of the dig­i­tal age” is extremely nar­row, although — as always — we will need to view the details at the time of the next Bud­get to know what the Gov­ern­ment really intends to do.

The gov­ern­ment also com­mits to “enhance the social and envi­ron­men­tal con­di­tions in our com­mu­ni­ties right across Canada”.  The gov­ern­ment is to be com­mended for the mea­sures it has already taken, and for com­mit­ting ongo­ing sup­port for the Vol­un­tary Sec­tor Ini­tia­tive.  The con­cept of “social econ­omy”, men­tioned in the Speech from the Throne, has been preva­lent in the Province of Que­bec.  CCA antic­i­pates this might mean con­tin­ued work will be done on the pol­icy capac­ity and fund­ing of the non-profit sec­tor, and improv­ing and redefin­ing char­i­ties so advo­cacy becomes a legit­i­mate purpose.

The future of Bill C-20, an Act to amend the Crim­i­nal Code (pro­tec­tion of chil­dren and other vul­ner­a­ble per­sons) and the Canada Evi­dence Act, remains a con­cern.  This was dropped from the Order Paper when the pre­vi­ous Par­lia­ment was pro­rogued on Novem­ber 7, 2003 (see CCA Bul­letin 39/03).  It would appear that this poorly drafted piece of leg­is­la­tion may have a future in the new ses­sion of the House of Com­mons, as the Throne Speech promises “The gov­ern­ment will do more to ensure the safety of chil­dren through a strat­egy to counter sex­ual exploita­tion of chil­dren on the Inter­net and by rein­stat­ing child pro­tec­tion leg­is­la­tion.” Based on the past track record of the Lib­eral gov­ern­ment, the CCA will con­tinue to mon­i­tor any changes to the Crim­i­nal Code that would elim­i­nate the defence of “artis­tic merit”, as we see this as counter-active to free­dom of expres­sion and the rights of all Canadians.

Other areas which might assist those in the cul­tural sec­tor include:

•“To meet the chal­lenges of the new econ­omy, Canada’s work­ers must have the oppor­tu­nity to upgrade their skills, to improve their lit­er­acy, to learn on the job, to move onto the path of life­long learn­ing.  The gov­ern­ment will there­fore refine and enhance its pro­grams to encour­age skills upgrad­ing, in con­cert with sec­tor coun­cils, unions, and busi­ness.” This should offer oppor­tu­ni­ties for orga­ni­za­tions such as the Cul­tural Human Resources Coun­cil to advo­cate for improved train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties and pro­fes­sional development.

•“… to help com­mu­ni­ties iden­tify chil­dren whose readi­ness to learn is at risk, the gov­ern­ment will extend its suc­cess­ful com­mu­nity pilot project, Under­stand­ing the Early Years, to at least 100 com­mu­ni­ties.” The CCA reit­er­ates its own com­mit­ment to pro­mot­ing the active par­tic­i­pa­tion of young peo­ple in the arts, through the exist­ing ArtsS­marts pro­gramme, and through the devel­op­ment of a fur­ther national ini­tia­tive to encour­age the arts in edu­ca­tion and youth par­tic­i­pa­tion in the arts.

•The com­mit­ment to the 2010 Win­ter Olympics in Vancouver/Whistler con­tin­ues; the games carry a con­sid­er­able cul­tural component.

Miss­ing from the Throne Speech was any men­tion of the thorny issue of for­eign own­er­ship of Canada’s broad­cast­ing sys­tem, an issue the CCA will be pur­su­ing assid­u­ously with the new gov­ern­ment over the com­ing months.