THE SUN SHOULD NEVER SET ON CULTURE

Ottawa , Decem­ber 10, 2004 — The Stand­ing Com­mit­tee on Cana­dian Her­itage sent a mes­sage to Cab­i­net and the Min­is­ter of Cana­dian Her­itage yes­ter­day, call­ing on them to announce the renewal of the Tomor­row Starts Today fund­ing by next week’s end of the Fall ses­sion of Parliament.

The Stand­ing Committee’s reg­u­lar meet­ing on Decem­ber 8 was pri­mar­ily focused on the renewal of TST , the three-year fund­ing pro­gram ini­ti­ated in 2001 by the Lib­eral gov­ern­ment of the day (and renewed for a sin­gle year last spring). The pro­gram “sun­sets” again on March 31, 2005, and the Mar­tin cab­i­net has yet to make any deci­sion on the funding’s renewal, leav­ing many in the cul­tural com­mu­nity anx­ious and unable to rea­son­ably plan for the 2005–2006 fis­cal year and beyond.

At the meeting’s con­clu­sion, mem­bers of the com­mit­tee passed the fol­low­ing motion, brought for­ward by Con­ser­v­a­tive Cul­ture Critic Bev Oda ( Durham, ON ):

That, in response to the request by the artists and cul­tural com­mu­ni­ties across Canada and the Fed­er­a­tion of Cana­dian Munic­i­pal­i­ties for the renewal of Tomor­row Starts today, the Min­is­ter of Cana­dian Her­itage report in the House the intent of this gov­ern­ment to renew or not renew this pro­gram before the end of this ses­sion of the House and whether it will be renewed as an A based pro­gram or not.

“A based” pro­grams are long term fund­ing pro­grams with­out sun­set dates which are eval­u­ated every five years. There was dis­cus­sion and agree­ment amongst the mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee on the need for TST or its suc­ces­sor to be an A based program.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the Depart­ment of Cana­dian Her­itage were present at the Com­mit­tee meet­ing to present the mem­bers with back­ground mate­r­ial on TST , and to answer ques­tions from the mem­bers. The DCH offi­cials empha­sized that TST is not merely a sin­gle pro­gram, but actu­ally a col­lec­tion of dis­tinct pro­grams, includ­ing Cul­tural Spaces Canada, Book Pub­lish­ing Indus­try Devel­op­ment Pro­gram, Cana­dian Cul­ture Online, and the Cul­tural Cap­i­tals of Canada. In total, TST funds rep­re­sent more than 65% of the Department’s sup­port for the arts, book pub­lish­ing, sound record­ing, new media indus­tries, and cul­tural export programs.

Though mem­bers of the com­mit­tee were ulti­mately sup­port­ive of the fund­ing, some expressed con­cerns on the man­ner in which it was dis­trib­uted. Con­ser­v­a­tive MP Gary Schel­len­berger ( Perth-Wellington , ON ) expressed con­cern that the fund­ing had been used in the past by the Lib­eral gov­ern­ment as a polit­i­cal tool, while Bloc Que­be­cois Cul­ture Critic Maka Kotto ( Saint-Larent , QC ) noted that his party would pre­fer to see all of the TST funds admin­is­tered by the provinces.

The DCH rep­re­sen­ta­tives noted that they are con­tin­u­ing to serve their “clients” by accept­ing appli­ca­tions for fund­ing pro­grams for the 2005–2006 fis­cal year, but with an expressed caveat that the fund­ing is con­tin­gent on the renewal of TST. NDP Cul­ture Critic Char­lie Angus ( Timmins-James Bay , ON ) expressed frus­tra­tion at the man­ner in which the renewal was being held up, and stated his con­cern that the fund­ing would be renewed, only after the arts com­mu­nity was sub­jected to a “dance of a thou­sand veils”.

Con­ser­v­a­tive Bev Oda fol­lowed on this point, express­ing the sen­ti­ment that “It’s appalling that arts groups have had to come to Ottawa to lobby for this renewal.”

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Depart­ment noted some of the key suc­cesses of Tomor­row Starts Today :

• Increas­ing links between artists and audi­ences in hun­dreds of com­mu­ni­ties through per­for­mances, exhi­bi­tions and invest­ments in phys­i­cal spaces
• Sup­port­ing next gen­er­a­tion of pro­fes­sional artists through training
• Build­ing the long-term eco­nomic future of arts organizations
• Build­ing a mod­ern and effi­cient Cana­dian book indus­try sup­ply chain, and increas­ing the pro­file of Cana­dian authors.
• Ensur­ing a promi­nent place for Cana­dian music tal­ent despite intense com­pe­ti­tion in dig­i­tal, global environment
• Cre­at­ing a uniquely Cana­dian pres­ence in both offi­cial lan­guages on the Internet
• Exports: expand­ing exports of Cana­dian cul­tural goods and ser­vices and diver­si­fy­ing mar­kets globally