Speech from the Throne: A Stronger Canada. A Stronger Economy. How it Affects Arts & Culture

CCA Bul­letin 6/10

March 3, 2010

 

Just the Facts

After a two month long pro­ro­ga­tion the Gov­er­nor Gen­eral of Canada, the Rt. Hon. Michaëlle Jean, deliv­ered the Speech from the Throne, open­ing the third ses­sion of Canada’s 40th Par­lia­ment. For a sec­ond time in as many Speeches, the gov­ern­ment focused on Canada’s econ­omy. How­ever, this time, the gov­ern­ment moved away from lay­ing out stim­u­lus plans, and moved towards address­ing deficit reduc­tion, while pro­mot­ing the achieve­ments made by Canada on the global stage. This Speech from the Throne will be fol­lowed by tomorrow’s 2010 Fed­eral Bud­get pre­sented by the Hon. Min­is­ter of Finance, James Flaherty.

The Gov­er­nor Gen­eral began her Speech by out­lin­ing the approach which will be taken in the third ses­sion of this Par­lia­ment: “The agenda our gov­ern­ment laid before par­lia­ment just over one year ago is largely in place through Canada’s Eco­nomic Action Plan, our Gov­ern­ment took deci­sive steps to pro­tect incomes, cre­ate jobs, ease credit mar­kets, and help work­ers and com­mu­ni­ties get back on their feet. As we begin to see mod­est improve­ments in growth and employ­ment, the task before us today is to fin­ish the work begun last year.”

“Jobs and growth remain the top pri­or­ity. Our gov­ern­ment will com­plete the sec­ond year of Canada’s eco­nomic action plan – guided by exten­sive con­sul­ta­tions with lead­ers in busi­ness, indus­try, and every­day work­ing peo­ple and their fam­i­lies – and make refine­ments where necessary…our atten­tion must also encom­pass the new mea­sures Canada needs for suc­cess in the mod­ern econ­omy. This will require a return to fis­cal bal­ance, secur­ing [a] strong bud­getary position.”

The Speech from the Throne makes it clear that bal­anc­ing the bud­get will be a foun­da­tion for a strong econ­omy. As stim­u­lus spend­ing is reduced after the com­ple­tion of the sec­ond year of the Action Plan, other steps will be taken to restrain fed­eral pro­gram spend­ing, including:

• Freez­ing the salaries of the Prime Min­is­ter, Min­is­ters, Mem­bers of Par­lia­ment, and Senators,
• Freeze over­all bud­get of Min­is­ters’ offices,
• Freeze depart­men­tal oper­at­ing budgets,
• Review of depart­men­tal admin­is­tra­tive services,
• Elim­i­nate unnec­es­sary appoint­ments to fed­eral agen­cies, boards, com­mis­sions, and Crown corporations,
• AND, aggres­sively review all depart­men­tal spend­ing to ensure value for money and tan­gi­ble results.

Tell me more

The gov­ern­ment laid out issues rang­ing from Canada’s aging pop­u­la­tion and health­care, to infra­struc­ture and indus­try, as well as Canada’s role as an inter­na­tional leader in the econ­omy and host of the G8 and G20 Sum­mits. Amidst all this, the Speech noted sev­eral points per­tain­ing to cul­ture, despite the fact that there is no explicit men­tion of the arts.

The need to update and main­tain Canada’s cul­tural infra­struc­ture was an ele­ment of the CCA’s pre-budget sub­mis­sion to the Stand­ing Com­mit­tee on Finance. The Speech from the Throne acknowl­edges this issue with a ref­er­ence made to “16,000 projects putting Cana­di­ans to work while lay­ing the foun­da­tion for future pros­per­ity. These projects range from roads and bridges to col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties, from social hous­ing to our cul­tural and her­itage insti­tu­tions.” The CCA hopes that in the Bud­get we will see invest­ment in cul­tural insti­tu­tions which include the arts. The CCA pre­vi­ously rec­om­mended that there be an increased invest­ment of $60 mil­lion to the Canada Cul­tural Spaces Fund. Often, cul­tural infra­struc­ture is a one-time ini­tia­tive which leaves arts facil­i­ties decay­ing over time. It is espe­cially impor­tant that infra­struc­ture out­side the large urban cen­tres receive fund­ing in order to fos­ter more artis­tic and cre­ative communities.

Under the aus­pice of “strength­en­ing a united Canada in a chang­ing world,” the Gov­er­nor Gen­eral acknowl­edged this coun­try as one of refuge. Within that notion, the gov­ern­ment will sup­port the estab­lish­ment of national mon­u­ments. The CCA encour­ages this recog­ni­tion and hopes that these projects will sup­ply oppor­tu­ni­ties for Cana­dian cre­ators and artists.

In ref­er­ence to the cre­ative econ­omy, the Speech addressed the need to launch a dig­i­tal econ­omy strat­egy in order to drive the adop­tion of new tech­nol­ogy across the econ­omy. To learn more about dig­i­tal strate­gies abroad, visit the British National Plan for Dig­i­tal Par­tic­i­pa­tion, or for a more inter­ac­tive approach watch the youtube user’s guide to ‘Dig­i­tal Britain’. You may also read an intro­duc­tory paper pre­sented by Nordic­ity out­lin­ing the neces­sity for a Cana­dian dig­i­tal strategy.

The Gov­er­nor Gen­eral also stated that intel­lec­tual prop­erty and artis­tic ideas must be pro­tected: “To encour­age new ideas and pro­tect the rights of Cana­di­ans whose research, devel­op­ment and artis­tic cre­ativ­ity con­tribute to Canada’s pros­per­ity, our Gov­ern­ment will also strengthen laws gov­ern­ing intel­lec­tual prop­erty and copy­right.” Fol­low­ing the 2008 fed­eral elec­tion which killed Copy­right Bill C-61, the sec­tor par­tic­i­pated in nation-wide con­sul­ta­tions and spec­u­la­tion on new copy­right leg­is­la­tion. The CCA expects to see new leg­is­la­tion tabled in the com­ing year to bring Canada into accor­dance with the WIPO treaty and inter­na­tional stan­dards of intel­lec­tual prop­erty protection.

The con­tro­ver­sial issue of glob­al­ized telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions was addressed in that the gov­ern­ment will “open Canada’s doors fur­ther to ven­ture cap­i­tal and to for­eign invest­ment in key sec­tors, includ­ing the satel­lite and telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions indus­tries.” Con­cerns arise from the sug­ges­tion by the Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Pol­icy Review Panel that it may be time to develop a sin­gle leg­isla­tive and reg­u­la­tory review process for broad­cast­ing and telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions. If this is an approach the gov­ern­ment takes, the own­er­ship and reg­u­la­tory review processes may be less vig­or­ous, result­ing in the admis­sion of increased for­eign investors.  Con­se­quently, Cana­dian under­tak­ings may become sub­ject to for­eign takeovers and weaken the con­tent require­ments within broad­cast­ing, cable, and satel­lite sec­tors. This an issue that the CCA will be fol­low­ing closely in the com­ing months to ensure that any open­ing of Cana­dian mar­kets does not become a race for the low­est com­mon denom­i­na­tor rather than the high­est stan­dards of qual­ity Cana­dian content.

Through free trade agree­ments the gov­ern­ment will pur­sue a broad, open mar­ket. In tomorrow’s Bud­get, the CCA will look for invest­ment in pro­mo­tion for Cana­dian arts abroad, and audi­ence devel­op­ment. These mea­sures would ensure that Cana­dian cre­ative pro­duc­ers can cap­i­tal­ize on cul­tural trade and arts pre­sen­ta­tion abroad, as well as encour­age the growth of an inter­na­tional arts audi­ence within Canada.

The Gov­er­nor Gen­eral con­cluded the government’s remarks by look­ing for­ward: “The future to which Cana­di­ans aspire will not arrive by chance. Grand visions for a nation’s future will come to noth­ing if not bal­anced by the means to pay for them. To real­ize the hopes Cana­di­ans hold for them­selves and their fam­i­lies, the econ­omy must remain our Government’s sin­gle most urgent pri­or­ity. Hope is borne on the wings of prosperity.”

What can I do?

Tomor­row, on March 4, read our bul­letin which will cover a pre­lim­i­nary exam­i­na­tion of how the 2010 Fed­eral Bud­get will impact arts and cul­ture in Canada. As the CCA noted in its pre-budget sub­mis­sion, we will be look­ing for increased invest­ment in mar­ket and audi­ence devel­op­ment for arts and cul­ture within Canada and abroad, as well as increased invest­ment in the cre­ative econ­omy: by sup­port­ing the Canada Coun­cil for the Arts and estab­lish­ing a sta­ble pro­gram for cul­tural sta­tis­tics. Finally, the CCA will be look­ing for an invest­ment in cul­tural infra­struc­ture in com­mu­ni­ties around Canada, as well as an invest­ment in train­ing our next gen­er­a­tion of arts and cul­tural workers.

Then, look for more in-depth cov­er­age by the CCA as the Main and Sup­ple­men­tary Esti­mates are released. Through­out the com­ing year, the CCA will exam­ine how fed­eral expen­di­ture man­age­ment will decrease the deficit. Specif­i­cally, the CCA will exam­ine how arts and cul­tural fund­ing through the Depart­ment of Cana­dian Her­itage and other fed­eral agen­cies will be tar­geted. The CCA will want to under­stand the com­pound affect of fund­ing decreases over the com­ing years and how pro­gram reduc­tion will impact the con­tribute of Cana­dian arts to the cre­ative economy.