Canadian Television Fund

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The Canadian Television Fund was created in 1996 as a cable industry-government partnership, one marketed as essential to support the broadcast and production of quality Canadian television programming. The Fund has distributed non-repayable grants to private production companies since its inception, money which does not require repayment. These subsidies are ultimately financed by Canadian consumers and taxpayers and support funding of programming in all of Canada's official languages, including Native Canadian languages.

On December 20, 2006, Jim Shaw, CEO of Shaw Communications Inc. informed the Canadian Television Fund that he would be pulling approximately $56 million per year out of the fund.1 The move was later followed by Videotron (a subsidiary of Quebecor Inc.) who announced their plans to withdraw their contributions on January 23, 2007.2

Per Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) regulations, cable and satellite television distributors in Canada are required to contribute 5% of their revenue to the fund, which the companies can pass on to their customers in the form of inflated rates service. Since such consumer costs are embedded in their fees for service, consumers are subject to pay the 5% levy plus P.S.T. and G.S.T. on the cost of the company subsidy program.

On July 20, 2007, Keith Mahar, a former manager at broadcaster CHUM Limited, submitted a report to the CRTC, entitled Profiteering in the Name of Culture, respecting the Canadian Television Fund [1]. The submission recommends a judicial review of alleged CRTC corruption related to the Fund which he contends has unjustly enriched cable companies. A copy of the submission is posted on the CRTC public file. On February 7, 2008, Mahar issued a press release covered by Reuters [2] which was critical of Prime Minister Stephen Harper for his alleged failure to act on information respecting related activities by the CRTC and corporations in the affair.