Senator Tannas: As Mr. Menzies was speaking, I was reminded of this old saying that I heard: “There is no problem that the government can’t make more complicated.” It also comes as a bit of a Canadian thing. There are many times when we can’t seem to go straight at things without complicating it a little bit in our rush to be nice, to be thorough, to be complete, to be fair or to make sure we don’t miss something.

The point of this bill — based on what we were told, and what I was told in the briefing from the government — was to make sure that the streaming services begin paying significant amounts of money into the funds to support artists across the country, as cable companies and other more traditional media fade away.

The majority of the concerns that I’ve heard, both at committee and in this chamber, are around potential issues that are outside that stated reason for the bill. The questions are as follows: Will small, specialized streaming services withdraw from Canada? Will user-generated content, producers and creators face interference? Will algorithms be co-opted by government to force us to somehow consume artistic product that is not of our choosing?

We received assurances — at committee from government witnesses, and in this chamber from senators — that our worries are not valid. We have actually inserted — thanks to the efforts of committee members — some amendments to help assure ourselves around that.

Yet still to come are the publishing of regulations and the CRTC actions in the future. We need to watch and ensure that our nightmares don’t become a reality. Much of the success — or failure — of the bill depends on the transformation of the current CRTC, and the shift to a more nimble regulator, as nothing kills innovation like delay.

I believe that the Senate will have a continuing and vital role to play with this bill over the next few years. I urge the Transport and Communications Committee to consider emulating the long-standing practice of the Banking Committee which regularly and systematically interacts with the Governor of the Bank of Canada.

We’ve heard, and it’s well-known, that this practice was welcomed by previous governors as being an excellent exercise in the exchange of ideas, as well as a personal responsibility-and-accountability exercise for the governor in a unique environment. We’ve heard similar comments from the Superintendent of Financial Institutions in the past at the Banking Committee — I’ve been involved with that; it’s a great exercise, and it’s one that should be emulated with the Transport and Communications Committee through frequent meetings with the chair of the CRTC, through the regulatory process and the execution process. It would be extremely valuable.

After the work that we did, the 100-plus witnesses we heard and the thousands of messages that we got from concerned Canadians across the country, that is the least we can do — to ensure that this bill is implemented in the way that we all have been given to understand that it will be implemented. Thank you.

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