44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 11, 2022 02:00PM
Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to speak to the measure taken to move this forward.
On behalf of all artists in the cultural community in Montreal and Quebec, it is high time that we take action and move forward. The current system is unfair and antiquated. It should have been changed a long time ago.
Why not move ahead quickly to study the bill, improve it and ensure that people on the Web can participate in artistic creation in Quebec and Canada?
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Madam Speaker, the hon. member is absolutely right. It is time for action. It is time to support our cultural community and the people who produce our heritage across Canada. The cultural sector has waited too long. We need to act now. That is why we are going to take the bill to the next stage.
Obviously, the debate and discussions on this bill will not end today. The study will continue in committee. The bill will then come back to the House for third reading, so there will still be plenty of time to discuss it.
However, it is essential to take action for our cultural communities, and that is what we are doing now.
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Madam Speaker, first of all, I find it passing strange that the minister is citing as an excuse for time allocation that there was a lot of time for debating Bill C-10 in the previous Parliament, so I think Canadians would be interested to know that this is truly just a repeat of Bill C-10 from the previous Parliament.
I have a very specific question for the minister. The government is committed to providing a policy directive to the CRTC after Bill C-11 is passed. The government will decide, after this bill is passed, how it will impact things like discoverability, Canadian content and digital-first creators. That impact will happen after Bill C-11 is passed, so we are being told, “Just trust us.”
I have a very simple question to ease the minds of many opposition MPs: Would the government be willing to table the policy directive to the CRTC prior to the passage of Bill C-11?
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Madam Speaker, the member will know two things. One is that the CRTC will only impose regulations that will make material impact in achieving the goal of the bill, which is specifically to level the playing field for platforms showcasing Canadian content.
We have a circumstance today where broadcasters in more traditional lines of media have an obligation to contribute back to Canadian culture and Canadian content, and it is only reasonable in the digital space that the same expectation be held. If Netflix and Disney are profiting from the Canadian market, the expectation that they are going to contribute back to the cultural fabric of that market is absolutely essential. That is not just something we ran on as a party, but many of the parties in this House ran on it.
I heard all over Canada that we have an essential obligation to support Canadian content and Canadian culture. This means that we have world-class talent that not only enriches our lives and helps tell the Canadian story, but, frankly, enriches the planet. Our obligation to say to those Internet giants that they have to contribute to the place they draw their profits from is something that is pre-eminently reasonable and levels the playing field with more traditional media forums.
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Madam Speaker, the Bloc Québécois does not support closure motions. We believe that democracy must take precedence over all else.
However, we must deplore the fact that the official opposition does not recognize that the current Bill C‑11 is much better crafted than the former Bill C‑10 and that it could continue to be improved in committee.
Quebec and Canadian artists have been waiting for decades for something to change. The Internet has changed everything. It seems to me that the time has come to pass this bill.
Does the hon. member not deplore the use of closure? It seems to us that the legislative agenda from now until the end of June is not that heavy and that we would have time to continue the debate.
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Madam Speaker, the hon. member is absolutely right. A lot of changes have been made to the new Bill C-11, which is before us today. That is important because, during the last election campaign, we heard a lot of opinions on this issue and on the need to support the cultural sector.
I have to thank the Bloc Québécois, whose members were behind many of the ideas for increasing support for the cultural sector and improving the bill in general.
I reiterate that members are going to have many opportunities to talk about the bill, improve it and amend it in upcoming stages, first at committee and then when it comes back here to the House. There will be plenty of time. This debate is just to move the bill forward to the next stage.
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Madam Speaker, there is some confusion here in the House.
One thing that is really fascinating from the opposite side is that the Liberals are trying to create legislation for what they are listening to on their Walkmans or Discmans. These are things that people do not use anymore, and the Liberals are trying to create this legislation for things that people do not do anymore. They are using an archaic method, the CRTC, which is nonsensical, in the opinion of many Canadians. When we look at it, there is a new way. It is called “the Internet”. This is how people are now getting their information. They are watching movies on it. No doubt, they are listening to music on it. To think that we need to adopt this “Liberal government knows best” style of government to continue to indoctrinate people in Canada is really beyond what anyone could possibly imagine.
I think the other part, when we begin to think about time allocation on this, is that approximately one-third of Canadians are under the age of 24, so they would probably be the highest users of this information. From this side of the House, we think it is exceedingly important that we give those approximately 10 million to 15 million people their due diligence and understanding of what the government is attempting to make them do.
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Madam Speaker, of course, the last time this legislation was updated, the technology the member is referencing was the technology that was prevalent, and the reality for how the technology is utilized now is very different. People are consuming media that is coming from online streaming sites and online streaming services that are not subject to the same rules that traditional media have been subject to.
I know the Conservatives traditionally have not supported Canadian artists and the idea that broadcasters have a responsibility to use some of their profits to support Canadian artists and to promote Canadian artists in what they put on, whether it is on the radio or on television. I suppose they are continuing their battle to block—
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- May/11/22 4:47:13 p.m.
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The hon. member for Regina—Lewvan is rising on a point of order.
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Madam Speaker, I would really appreciate it if the House leader would stick to the facts and not spread misinformation. If he actually has proof that the Conservatives—
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- May/11/22 4:47:29 p.m.
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This is debate.
The hon. government House leader.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate the member's anxiousness to participate in the debate, but I will say very clearly that the Conservatives talk about defunding the CBC and about not supporting Canadian content, including in this specific case. Does the member across, who is arguing against support for this bill, not believe that Disney or Netflix, which profit here, should be promoting Canadian content? Does he not believe they should be giving dollars back to Canadian producers of culture and content? It is a battle they fought for a long time—
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- May/11/22 4:48:01 p.m.
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We have a lot of individuals wanting to ask questions.
The hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni.
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Madam Speaker, maybe my colleague, the government House leader, could speak about the sense of urgency. Cultural workers and artists suffered the most under the pandemic. Many of them could not operate at all for two years, and many of them could not even access the programs that were offered to them. When people have zero revenue coming in, the wage subsidy does not help them, nor the rent assistance program. The sense of urgency is real.
In the meantime, the big web giants had record profits. They took all the gas out. There was a massive economic leakage happening in our country. Maybe the House leader could talk about how critical it is that we plug the economic leakage to the big web giants and that we get to this work rapidly and quickly and get this to committee.
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Madam Speaker, the reality is that, as we have seen a shift in the way we consume entertainment and media, there has not been a similar shift to apply the same rules that apply to traditional media to new media.
The member is absolutely right. We saw during the pandemic that the artists who perform in local venues and enrich our local communities got hit incredibly hard; they were not able to participate during the pandemic. At the same time, the streaming giants enjoyed record profits and record participation.
This bill would continue a long tradition in Canada of saying that if people profit from the entertainment industry in this country and profit from the cultural sector, they have an obligation to pay back into it and help build it up. As I look at cities and communities across the country, and I look at the quality and depth of the culture that is there, I would say it is there, in no small part, because of that rule, because of the obligation we put that if people profit from that sector, they have to invest back in it. I would say that it is not only our local communities and artists that have benefited from it, but I think the world has valued the Canadian voice in culture and heritage.
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Madam Speaker, what we continue to hear again and again from across the aisle is that there is an agenda that needs to be followed, and therefore there needs to be this push for Bill C-11 to be brought through the House of Commons without proper debate.
That is wrong. That is absolutely anti-democratic. There are 338 elected individuals who were sent to this place to rigorously debate issues. That is our responsibility, and that responsibility is being taken from us right now. That is not just shameful for those who are in this House; it is actually shameful because of what it does to Canadians.
I represent 125,000 people from the riding of Lethbridge. You just squashed their voices.
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- May/11/22 4:51:12 p.m.
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I remind members not to address questions and comments directly to the Chair.
I will allow the hon. House leader to answer.
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Madam Speaker, I want to make two points. The first is on this bill, which is that there is absolutely an agenda. The agenda is to say that those who make money from the cultural sector in this country have an obligation to invest back into it. That has been the tradition in this country. It just has not been updated to reflect the new media so that our content creators and the community that suffered during the pandemic can be supported and Canadian art and culture can be expanded.
With respect to democracy, let us be very clear. I was there in opposition when the Conservatives created a 200-page handbook on how to control, like puppeteers, committees, how to shut them down and how to run them through their parliamentary secretaries. I was here in this House day in, day out as we saw incredible command and control of everything that happened in this place.
It is rich beyond measure to compare that to this. There is more than enough opportunity to go from here, to have further debate at committee and for it to return to the House.
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Madam Speaker, here is one last little plea on my part. I am always appalled to see how the government ignores the reality of our artists, artisans, content creators and those who revitalize culture in our world, our beautiful world.
Today, we are spending more time debating whether we should take even more time to debate something that already existed and is now back on the table.
In the previous Parliament, we had Bill C-10. Now it is back on the table as Bill C-11. It has been reworked and improved. The Bloc Québécois put a lot of effort into that, and the sector is happy, but here we still are, talking about the time allocated for debate.
I am rather appalled. I would like the House leader to comment on the urgent need to take action on behalf of these people who are losing money—
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- May/11/22 4:53:32 p.m.
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Order. There is very little time left and I have to give the government House leader the opportunity to respond.
The government House leader.
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