SPOR Committee Meeting

SUB-COMMITTEE ON THE STUDY OF SPORT IN CANADA

SOUS-COMITÉ SUR L'ÉTUDE DU SPORT AU CANADA

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Wednesday, March 29, 2000

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[English]

The Chair (Mr. Dennis J. Mills (Broadview—Greenwood, Lib.)): I'd like to begin by welcoming our guests from CBC, Mr. Asselin and Ms. Nancy Lee.

Before we begin with your testimony, I'd like to pass on, through you, to your organization a special compliment I've been asked to deliver by many of my colleagues from all parties. It goes to your CBC Newsworld unit for the tremendous work they did on behalf of the family farmers of Canada back in mid-January—their 14-hour exposé. We had support from the Reform Party, the New Democratic Party—all parties. I think your organization, radio and television but especially Newsworld, did a terrific job, the whole team.

I now turn the floor over to you.

Mr. Daniel Asselin (Director, Sport Program Services, French Television, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation): We'll be sure the people get the message. Thank you very much.

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[Translation]

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, we are pleased to be here today to speak about amateur sports programming on CBC/Radio-Canada and to give our views on recommendations 40 and 43 contained in the report Sports in Canada: Leadership, partnership and accountability.

My name is Daniel Asselin and I am Director of Sport Program Services at Radio-Canada. I had the privilege of appearing before you about two years ago and I followed your subsequent deliberations closely. At the time, I was accompanied by Mr. Alan Clark, who was the head of Television Network Sports at CBC. Alan has a new position in the corporation. So I am accompanied today by Nancy Lee, who is Director of TV Network Sports at CBC. I will turn the floor over to her.

[English]

Ms. Nancy Lee (Executive Director, TV Network Sports, English Television, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation): Thank you, Daniel.

We're going to do a bit of a tag team here, back and forth, as we go through our presentation.

As we presented almost two years ago, we believe at the CBC that sports programming is very much a part of what our mandate is for the heritage of our corporation, and certainly an area of expertise for us. We believe that sport contributes to a shared national consciousness and identity. It also allows the CBC to capture and convey some of what we believe are the defining moments of Canadian history. It also provides a platform to reflect the country to itself and to reflect Canadians to one another.

[Translation]

Mr. Daniel Asselin: On French television, we have decided to offer sports programming focussed more on amateur athletes than professional sports. Two years ago, we dropped our rights to the Formula 1, and as everyone knows, we are no longer involved in baseball, at least for the time being.

We have decided to focus our programming on the Olympic Games. Two years ago, when we obtained 10-year coverage of the Olympic Games, our initial reaction was to say that we could not go to the Olympic Games every two years, turn it into a huge 15-day production and then disappear, returning only two years later to cover the Olympic Games again. So we decided to focus our programming around that. It will give us an opportunity to boost the visibility of Olympic athletes in Canada, and we have decided to add more magazine-style sports programs.

[English]

Ms. Nancy Lee: The subcommittee report on sports, tabled in November 1998, contained many important recommendations, and we would like to congratulate the subcommittee for delivering what we believe is an excellent report. We wish to express our support for the many hours of work you did.

The CBC, like many stakeholders involved in the development and promotion of sports in Canada, is pleased that as a result of the subcommittee's report, the government has appointed a Secretary of State (Amateur Sport). We believe Minister Coderre is already exercising an extremely positive influence on sports in Canada.

Now we want to just review what the report's recommendations were, as far as the CBC is concerned. The report contained two major recommendations pertaining to the CBC and Radio-Canada. Recommendation 40 states that the government direct the CBC and Radio-Canada to broadcast more sporting events involving Canada's national teams, rather than the restricted window of events they currently present.

Recommendation 43 states that Radio-Canada and CBC be required to broadcast a minimum number of hours of amateur sports in both official languages, and that the actual number of hours broadcast be equivalent on both networks.

It's our view that neither of those two recommendations recognizes the independence given to the CBC under the Broadcasting Act. The CBC requires both independence and flexibility in its programming decisions in order to fulfil its mandate under the act. Furthermore, both recommendations do not adequately consider the current regulatory regime. The Broadcasting Act spells out the players in the system, their mandates, and the interrelationship. One of those players, the CRTC, is charged with regulating the industry to ensure that a balanced programming mix is available to all Canadian viewers.

In addition, recommendation 40 poses some problems, in that for the CBC to broadcast a given event it needs to successfully bid and acquire the broadcasting rights. Our ability to do that is limited by the fact that we have to compete with other broadcasters for those rights, in some cases, and by our own financial circumstances. Also, the CBC must serve the interests of all Canadians, and as a result, we must have a broad programming mix.

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In the terms of recommendation 43, it's important to point out that the viewing habits and preferences of each market are different, and that provision for those differences is made in the Broadcasting Act. The CBC is committed to responding to the needs and preferences of both its French and English audiences, and we believe this commitment is reflected in our programming priorities and programming mixes.

We have several points to discuss with you in terms of updating you on where we're at with our coverage, both from SRC and CBC. We'd like to continue on that front, and I'll hand it over to Daniel.

[Translation]

Mr. Daniel Asselin: I am going to tell you a little bit about amateur sports on French television. We have a daily half-hour sports bulletin that covers all events from sea to sea. It provides excellent coverage of amateur sport.

Since we obtained the rights for the Olympic Games, we have worked on creating two new programs focussed exclusively on amateur sports. For the past two weeks now, on Monday afternoons, we have been broadcasting a program called Olympicado. It is a program for young people aged 9 to 16 that aims to clearly explain the different olympic disciplines.

The second program will be broadcast in May. It will take us up to Sydney; it is called L'aventure olympique. It is a weekly hour-long magazine that will be broadcast during prime time and that spotlights Canadian athletes preparing for the Sydney Games.

For the past two years, we have been highlighting amateur sports in a public affairs program called Franc jeu that we broadcast Saturday evenings at 6:30PM. We also have a program on participatory sports called Vélo Mag and, in collaboration with independent producers, we have aired documentaries on Maurice Richard, Jacques Villeneuve, Bruny Surin and Donovan Bailey, and we will soon be airing one on Sylvie Fréchette.

So as you can see, we have put the spotlight on amateur athletes. Maurice Richard was not an amateur.

We are going to be presenting the World Track and Field Championships in Edmonton in 2001, and last summer, we broadcast the Pan-American Games from Winnipeg for three hours a day over 15 days.

We are preparing for coverage of the Francophonie Games that will be held in Ottawa/Hull in 2001. Since February, we have created in collaboration with the Canadian Olympic Association a web site on amateur sports and athletes. The site also includes coverage of Olympic sports. We have prepared portraits of 258 Canadian athletes, male and female, and our web site has had an average of 5,600 weekly visitors since it was launched. That has doubled visits to the Radio-Canada.ca/sports site which, obviously, has significantly increased French content on the Internet.

[English]

Ms. Nancy Lee: The role of amateur sports on CBC television is to showcase Canadian athletic talent. We also want to develop and feature the Olympians of tomorrow; increase the exposure of Canadian women athletes; help support the amateur sports associations; and complement our coverage of professional sports.

About 18 months ago, we did a review within our department of our coverage of amateur sport at that time. As part of that review, we set priorities. Those priorities were very clearly to increase the amount of hours we covered, as well as the variety of sports we covered.

It was announced in some areas with the associations in May, but it was sort of officially announced when we presented it to the CRTC last June. It truly got going last October. It means that by the end of this next fiscal year, we will have doubled our coverage of amateur sport. In actual fact, it means that a year and a half ago we were doing 120 hours of original programming, and, if my math's correct, 12 months from now we will be doing 180 hours.

As I mentioned earlier, it was very important for us to increase the variety of sports we covered. We have traditionally done swimming, track and field, and gymnastics. We've made a concentrated effort to cover badminton, table tennis, judo, and wrestling—events that normally don't get covered by us or any other broadcaster.

It all comes under the title of CBC Sports Saturday. For those who live in the eastern time zone, it starts at noon every day and goes until 6 p.m. As I listed before, it covers a variety of sports.

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In addition to doing what we call event coverage—we do the entire swim meet or the entire track meet—we believe it's also important to cover the stories of the athletes, so we created a documentary unit. “Unit” is a strong word; it's one person we hired, who we brought over from the current affairs section in CBC. Essentially the unit grows as a lung. When it expands.... We're doing currently an 18-part series called The Olympians, which you can see Tuesdays at 7 o'clock local time, and also it's repeated on Saturday afternoons. We tell stories of past Olympians. We want to prepare the audience for coming up to Sydney. It's hosted by Brian Williams.

Similar to Radio-Canada, we've done and are continuing to do documentaries, sometimes with independent producers, sometimes with our colleagues in other parts of the country. They include, most recently, a documentary you'll see in another week's time on the Arctic Winter Games and a documentary that was on a couple of weeks ago on Jonathan Power.

In addition to the volume and also the variety, we've tried to make a concentrated effort to get more amateur sport in prime time. Similar to Radio-Canada, we were at the Pan Am Games and did two hours each night over, I think, 16 days, out of Winnipeg. We also did nine days of coverage from the World Track and Field Championship in Seville in August, which was very new to us.

We put show jumping in prime time last September, two events from Spruce Meadows, the reason being that on Saturday afternoons the audience had been actually very good for equestrian, and we decided it was time to see how it would go in prime time. The demographic is very large in terms of the age group, but there's a strong female component to the demographic, and not enough sports are put on for women. We are very pleased. They each got half a million viewers. To compare that, when we put on our hockey right now, it gets about 1.3 million. I'm very pleased with half a million on show jumping last September.

And last week we aired and broadcast the Canadian Amateur Sport Awards on prime-time television for the first time.

The other work we try to do, because we do see it as our job as the public broadcaster, is to help the sports associations. As you know very well, they very much need sponsorship support, and we try to advise them in terms of how to seek sponsorship support. We work with them on simple things such as signage about the swimming pool. We worked with the Water Polo Association to get them to sell their rights in Europe last year when we did an event for them out of Winnipeg.

We've also recently begun using our own broadcast facilities in Toronto to showcase amateur events. Two weeks ago we did badminton and two weeks from now we're going to do table tennis. It's marvellous to see it in the building. We've never actually done sporting events inside before. I've promised my vice-president we will not do swimming; we don't have a large enough area for it. But if you've been there, we have this lovely atrium, and we actually could put a trampoline in there. We can't put tumbling, because we don't have anything long enough for the tumbling people to come forward.

What it did was it gave exposure to badminton and table tennis and wrestling that they would never, ever get, because it was novel and it was in the building. I brought some clippings. The papers picked up on it. You don't see badminton on television, and I think a huge part of it was because it was in our building. We plan to continue doing that.

I'll hand it back over to Daniel.

[Translation]

Mr. Daniel Asselin: The Olympic Games: Sydney, for us, is tomorrow morning. The Games will be held from September 15 to October 1. We have the rights to the Olympic Games until 2008. That represents five Olympics. For us, the Olympics are the cornerstone of amateur sports programming on CBC and Radio-Canada. In Sidney, we will be providing 850 hours of coverage over six television services, CBC, Radio-Canada, Newsworld, RDI, TSN and RDS, in both official languages.

With this new Olympic adventure, we created a partnership with a private broadcaster, TSN/RDS, to maximize use of rights and provide Canadians with the best possible coverage. To give you an example, Radio-Canada and CBC are going to continue to do the work for which we are recognized: in other words, we are going to go from one event to another and focus on Canadian athletes.

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Our partner, TSN/RDS, for whom we will be producing, will be able to broadcast an entire basketball game. People who want to watch the Canadian basketball team play Great Britain will be able to see the entire game, whereas at Radio-Canada or CBC, we will just cover the last 10 minutes. In the meantime, we are going to present other sports.

So Canadian viewers will have an opportunity to choose the sport that interests them more or to stick to the traditional coverage they know at CBC and Radio-Canada.

Given the expertise of CBC and SRC, we are going to provide the visual feed for TSN and RDS. Our partnership goes much farther than just pictures: we are also going to be sharing talent. This is a first for Radio-Canada and CBC. We did a little bit of that during the coverage of the Pan-American Games, and we are going to be doing much more at the Olympics.

So you will find RDS talent on the air at Radio-Canada and vice versa. It is important to remember that this initiative is self-financing, not a penny of parliamentary appropriation will be used. All of our coverage will be from a Canadian perspective and we will be focussing on our athletes. Viewers want to see our athletes.

We talk about collaboration, and I want to give you an example of collaboration between CBC and Radio-Canada, because we are cooperating more and more to fund this operation. We are currently preparing about 100 profiles of Canadian athletes. Our experience has shown that people adore this type of profile because it puts a human face on the athletes and helps us to get to know them.

For example, last summer at the Pan-American Games, we did a profile on Guivi Sissaouri, who won a silver medal at the Olympic Games in Atlanta. People do not remember his silver medal from Atlanta. However, people remember the profile we did on him last summer. People who saw it still talk about it. Sissaouri, during the day, works as a florist; in the evening, he is an Olympic wrestler. We did an introductory profile and people still talk about it. Together, we are preparing about 100 profiles for the Sydney Olympic Games.

[English]

Ms. Nancy Lee: I'm going to pick up on a point Daniel mentioned—I'm sure you all see it in the coverage we do—in terms of our covering the Olympics from a Canadian perspective. Simply put, it means we do have a focus on the achievements of Canadians, but it also means that when there are key international stories, we cover those as well.

For those who read the papers and who live in any cities that are close to the border, we know the Americans who can get our coverage prefer to watch ours, because we do stories of athletes from other countries. We don't concentrate just on our own. We're very proud of doing that.

This will be a bit of a plug here, but I'll take this opportunity to say that all of our programming will be going live, despite the 15- or 16-hour difference with Sydney. There will be some taping when we're sleeping, but it's a key part of our coverage. When the 100 metres is on, or any event, we want Canadians to be able to see it. Just as Canadians got up in the middle of the night to watch the speed skating, we hope you will all get up in the middle of the night to watch the swimming and the other events.

A key part of the Olympics, as certainly you covered in your report, is the coverage of athletes with disabilities. We can answer questions on this, but I will review our programming.

It's a difficult area for us to cover. When you go to an Olympics or Paralympics, you're bound by the coverage you're given by the host committee. It's been rather problematic in Sydney coming up with that coverage, but our plans together are to do event coverage of the Paralympics. We also plan to have coverage similar to our Olympians series, where we go into the homes of athletes training for the Paralympics. We cover their achievements in Sydney and then we do follow-up.

One of the reasons we want to do that.... My hope is to get that into prime time. When we do event coverage of the Paralympics and it's two or three weeks old, it's really hard to ask the network to put this into prime time. So this is our way, in the department, of trying to give coverage that's greater than what we'd normally do on Saturday afternoon.

In conclusion, we believe sports programming is very much a part of the CBC's mandate, our heritage and our expertise. We are very committed to both providing continued excellence in sports programming in general and to promoting and showcasing amateur sport and its athletes on both our networks.

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That's our presentation. We'd welcome any questions.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Mr. Inky Mark.

Mr. Inky Mark (Dauphin—Swan River, Canadian Alliance): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you for coming before the committee. I'm very happy to hear you're willing to take risks and explore other sports areas to broadcast to Canadians. I think it's very necessary to really show that our public broadcasters are interested in all sports, not just the normal sports that most of us are familiar with through the Olympic Games. I know just watching college sports, and more of it as you broadcast the national college scene, has created a lot of interest in the regions as well.

I was wondering if you considered broadcasting national seniors' games. As you know—as we all become older—seniors are very involved, very organized, certainly on the provincial level as well as the national level. That may be an opportunity down the road that you could—

The Chair: Is that a plug for the clerk?

Mr. Inky Mark: No. I didn't realize that. I think we're all close to being seniors around this table—well, most of us, not quite all of us.

Mr. John Solomon (Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, NDP): Speak for yourself.

Mr. Inky Mark: Anyway, my question is, how will the demographics of the audience change, as well as the numbers, with the change in focus or as you broaden the perspective of covering more sports at the amateur level?

Ms. Nancy Lee: Is your question based on following the baby boom?

Mr. Inky Mark: How will the makeup of your audience change? Do you think it will change?

Ms. Nancy Lee: In terms of a greater coverage?

Mr. Inky Mark: Yes.

Ms. Nancy Lee: That's tough. Let me deal with the women, because a female audience has been very hard to attract. I won't go on the professional side—it's a different story altogether—but just in terms of the amateur sport, part of our selection of the sport we cover is that we prefer the sport be open equally to both genders. So when we investigate putting beach volleyball on the air, we look at it in terms of whether men and women are competing, whether the prize money is the same, if there is prize money—in this amateur world there is prize money—because I believe if young women see women competing, it should help our demographic. My hope, also, is that it's going to help young women see that they actually can compete. We're doing women's softball, and we did women's water polo, that sort of thing.

In terms of the changing demographic of the country—what you're referring to—we're attempting to do it, probably not as well as we could. We're investigating things like cricket, for example, which is not a sport that is normally put on the CBC. But where we set our priorities is that the sport has to be part of a major games we're covering. As you can well imagine, we get inundated with requests to put coverage on from everyone, except that I haven't heard too much from the seniors. So hold off writing for a bit. What we're looking at and trying to figure out is whether cricket is something we want to get into. Is cricket something at the Commonwealth Games? Are we putting the Commonwealth Games on? It's certainly being reviewed.

We're probably moving more slowly than we can, but to be perfectly honest, the reason for doing table tennis and badminton is that I'm definitely hoping to reach a group of people who play that sport, either recreationally or at an elite level, who might be interested in watching it on television. The e-mail and voice mail we got on table tennis, the week we put it on the world championships, was equal to the very many comments we get about hockey. So there's certainly an audience out there for it, that's for sure.

The Chair: Thank you. I'd like to now go to Ms. Phinney.

Oh, did you have another short question?

Mr. Inky Mark: Yes, just one short question.

The Chair: A short question.

Mr. Inky Mark: I was going to ask you, with the pressure to increase amateur sports broadcasting, what stress does that put on things like professional hockey broadcasting? Is it possible?

Ms. Nancy Lee: When we did the review of our planning and decided essentially that our goal was to double our coverage in a year and a half, there was no new money coming in, that's for sure. So we redirected from our three professionals—we do CFL, baseball, and hockey—cut their budgets down, redirected them, and made a very concentrated effort in terms of seeking sponsorship. There are certain companies out there that are very supportive of amateur sport, the Royal Bank being one. We would not have track and field on the air, Edmonton would not be hosting the world championships, if it weren't for the Royal Bank. It's a very circuitous route, I could explain, but that's essentially how we went and are able to afford the coverage we do.

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There's no one in our department—there are 49 of us—who doesn't work on amateur sport. I'll give one example. Our director, who directs Hockey Night on Saturday nights, was the producer of the amateur sports awards. There's a commonality of moving people down to do a sport in between. Have I answered the question?

Mr. Inky Mark: Yes and no, because I'm just wondering how it's going to pressure the loss of broadcasting for professional sports if you're expected to increase your amateur sports coverage by 50% over two years.

Ms. Nancy Lee: We can't cover amateur sport without the professional. We use both in terms of the personnel structure and the technical structure, because, unfortunately, it is not a break-even when you cover amateur sports. Sponsors aren't up there asking to be seen on Saturday afternoon in the various sports that we put on. If we didn't have it, it would be problematic, and that, in its reverse, would truly affect how we're able to cover amateur sport.

[Translation]

Mr. Daniel Asselin: I can add that it is always a question of choice. When our budgets are allocated, we are told... Let's look at the example of Formula 1 that was broadcast for years on Radio- Canada. When Bernie Ecclestone, who owns the rights, proposed we broadcast it, it made no sense for us to devote so much money to it. We did have the money in our envelope for sports broadcasting. We decided to create a sports magazine that focussed more on amateur sport than professional sport. It is always a question of choice.

It is also clear that when we decided to broadcast the Olympic Games, it was important for us at Radio-Canada to earmark funds for amateur sports. Choices had to be made; we dropped professional sports. But our industry has also changed. Ten years ago, TSN and RDS did not exist, nor did Sportsnet or TQS. In its proposal to the CRTC, TQS said that it would not be broadcasting sports, but it did. The others broadcast sports too. So we decided to focus more on amateur sports.

[English]

The Chair: Ms. Phinney.

Ms. Beth Phinney (Hamilton Mountain, Lib.): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to thank you for being here and congratulate you on the way you present the Olympics every year. I just wish we didn't have to work during that period of time. We could spend 24 hours a day watching.

Speaking as an MP and from how my constituents feel about amateur sports, it's the T-ball that the little five-year-olds and four-year-olds are playing, working their way up the leagues in baseball.... I didn't realize it, but I found out a few months ago that we have thousands of children in our area playing basketball. There are thousands who play soccer. Have you thought at any time—and maybe I've missed it—of doing stories about that level of amateur sports, where it all starts, what the parents have to do, what those coaches have to do, what the children do, and how they go all the way up through the leagues? That's just a thought, not my question, but maybe you could answer it in a minute.

I think my question will lead into that, or maybe answer the question. CBC has different market sectors and each regional sector has its own broadcasters responsible for covering the local amateur sports events in that area. CBC National covers the national scope. We've heard from some sporting communities that while there's an increase in coverage of the amateur sports at a national level, this is not going down to the regional levels. I wondered how CBC is going to ensure that their national policy in amateur sports is echoed in their regional sectors. Is there a commitment in the budget that reflects regional amateur sports?

Ms. Nancy Lee: I'll answer that first, and then I'll go back to the other question.

Not specifically in the sense that there's been an allocation. Internally we operate differently, but it doesn't stop us from sharing information. There's an internal system on the English side where, when we've covered the Olympic wrestling trials and the event has happened on a Saturday and Sunday, we will not put it on nationally until the following Saturday or Sunday but we send out clips of that coverage because we had all those cameras there. We interviewed the athletes. That information is sent out across the country so that the regional sportscasters in all of our supper hours, as well as I believe our affiliates, have access to this as well so that they can pick up those stories of events we have covered. There's a sharing, not strictly on a budget but there's certainly a sharing of coverage.

• 1600

Unfortunately, I can't speak specifically to the amateur sport coverage in terms of how it's covered at the local level, and I would only be giving you an opinion based on watching it at CBLT in Toronto, where I'm located.

In terms of your other point about the grassroots, I know it won't be the sport you might like, but on February 19 we did 13 hours of hockey coverage. It wasn't professional. We started with a triple-header. We wanted to show all three Canadian teams, so that meant we were starting at four in the afternoon. But it was very important to us, not to talk about taxes, not to talk about salaries, but to talk about all of the families and the people who are affected by that sport and who participate in that sport. Of course, Saturday was perfect for us because the arenas were filled. We had live locations at 17 different locations in terms of...there were three in the north. I know we hit every single province. That was the plan, to get the stories that were told of the bus driver who was also the announcer on the junior team out of...I forget where in Alberta. But an excellent story we did, one of my favourites, is in Fox Valley, Saskatchewan.

Ms. Beth Phinney: You're not answering my question.

Ms. Nancy Lee: I'm sorry. It was about doing more grassroots stories? I thought that's what the first one was.

The Chair: We're going to have to tighten up the responses, Ms. Lee.

Ms. Nancy Lee: I'm sorry.

The Chair: Go ahead.

Ms. Phinney, do you want to maybe clarify your question?

Ms. Beth Phinney: Do you know whether there's any effort being put into coverage of regional sports by CBC, and is there money there to do more of it? Is there any at all now?

The Chair: Maybe we could add onto the question. You calculate all these hours here. Do you calculate by region how much time is going into amateur sport?

Ms. Nancy Lee: No, the calculations—

The Chair: How do you get these numbers? They're national?

Ms. Nancy Lee: Yes, they're national. It comes out of my department. To be brief, I will get you that information. I don't think I could give you a very good answer at this point in time on the regional reflection.

Ms. Beth Phinney: I know I've already taken up quite a bit of time, so we'll—

The Chair: I want to feel comfortable with this. I think you're onto something.

Ms. Beth Phinney: If you're looking at your policy, you must know you have this much money, and maybe all of it from what you're saying goes to covering the national amateur sports. Is there any thought or do you have any policy program about regions? Are we going to put 10% of our money for amateur sports into the Hamilton-Niagara region and showing events that are going on there, or some in British Columbia? Do you have any policy about regional sports?

Mrs. Elsie Wayne (Saint John, PC): What about the maritime provinces?

Ms. Beth Phinney: I'm sorry, I missed them.

Ms. Nancy Lee: We do. When we select—and in the department I do—in terms of the coverage, we look in terms of reflecting the entire country. We're not covering T-ball in Hamilton—

Ms. Beth Phinney: Or anywhere.

Ms. Nancy Lee: No, and I can't see us doing that. We're restricted by two things. One is the time on the schedule and one always comes down to money. If we're going to reflect amateur sport in this country, I think we should be doing it at the level that would enhance the little kids playing T-ball, particularly the girls. We're putting on softball this June, women's softball, and they're going to be competing at the Olympics. I want the young T-ballers in Hamilton to be watching those women play so that one day they may hope, if they want to, to continue to play T-ball recreationally or at the Sydney Olympics.

Ms. Beth Phinney: So there's no policy there at all to show regional sports.

Ms. Nancy Lee: We make statistics on what areas of the country we're in, and I can tell you that in the Maritimes we haven't done a good job.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: No.

The Chair: I think you've touched on an excellent point there. Mr. Solomon put up his hand first and then...listen, we're going to get everybody today.

Mr. John Solomon: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The Chair: Ms. Wayne, you were the second person.

Please proceed.

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Mr. John Solomon: First of all, let me publicly acknowledge our appreciation from Saskatchewan's perspective of the CBC's contribution to our diverse country. We're very supportive of the CBC out in Saskatchewan. I represent a Regina and a rural district as well.

I have a couple of items I wanted to raise. The most important one to me at the moment is a suggestion and an unofficial request I would have of the CBC. Sandra Schmirler passed away at age 37. There was a great television tribute to her and her funeral was carried live. What I would ask you to try to do, if possible, is try to get a video cassette of everything you could in terms of her achievements, whether it was a copy of the tribute...and provide copies of this video cassette to each of her children. Her children are very young and they really wouldn't know their mother in five years—

Ms. Nancy Lee: We've done that already.

Mr. John Solomon: You've done that? Perfect. Then I guess it's completed. I appreciate that.

Ms. Nancy Lee: She worked for us. We're very close to Sandra and her family.

Mr. John Solomon: Yes, that's great. Thank you very much for that.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Sorry to interrupt.

Mr. John Solomon: The issue I wanted to raise with regard to amateur sport is that soccer is a very significant sport that's coming up. I think we won a gold cup. It's also a growth sport, I believe, among younger Canadians. I used to be an amateur soccer coach in one of my former movies. I'd like to know how you're planning to deal with the issue of soccer.

The second question is, do you classify curling as an amateur sport or a professional sport?

Thirdly, I'd like a comment as to how the following very important event occurred in Regina just last week but was ignored by everybody. We had the North American short-track speed skating championships in Regina. It was North American. There were 13 U.S. states represented. Every province and territory was there. I was at the official opening. It happened to take place across the street from my office. I was also part of the sponsorship, but maybe that's why it didn't happen.

I'm wondering why the media ignored something like this, such a major amateur sporting event, in particular since we won a couple of gold medals in the Olympics on short-track skating. So if you could give me a comment on that, I'd appreciate it. It was unanimous. It wasn't just the CBC, but every television network in North America ignored it.

Those young people are very fast on skates.

The final point, Mr. Chair—and I won't raise any more questions—is this. Are there any plans with regard to first nations games? They always have national games, winter and summer, and I'm wondering if you have any plans to follow those and produce some programs relating to that. Thank you.

The Chair: Short question and short answers.

Ms. Nancy Lee: On soccer, we made the point earlier in terms of acquiring...when you put programs on the air you have to acquire the rights, and soccer is presented in Canada as a package. It's a package that, for all intents and purposes, doesn't want to be broken up. Because we're not on 24 hours a day, essentially we have x amount of hours to put on, so the package that came to us, I think about a year and a half or two years ago, contained—I'm guessing here—between 20 and 25 events, which essentially is three hours of each event. It was too much. We would have preferred to have picked, but they didn't want to sell it and it's their prerogative not to break it up.

For curling, for the events we do in terms of our count, we don't count it as...but we believe it should be counted as an Olympic sport. We all have different ways of describing amateur sport between the broadcasters. TSN counts differently, as does the CRTC, but at this stage we're not counting it.

Mr. John Solomon: So curling is classified as a professional sport?

Ms. Nancy Lee: When I did my 120 hours, it's the swimming, it's the track and field. We don't count either curling or figure skating—the figure skating we get as professional.

I'll try to keep brief here.

In short-track speed skating we did four events this year. One of the reasons I could say why not the North American, and I didn't know it was in your riding—

Mr. John Solomon: Regina, Saskatchewan, but it doesn't make any difference.

Ms. Nancy Lee: —is that the world's best are actually from outside North America and it's through the association. The association required CBC to broadcast the short-track in October in Montreal in order for them to be able to send their athletes to the world track around the world. As a result of us producing that, we acquired three other world track, short-track speed skating events from around the world. I know that's not probably the answer you were looking for, but that's how we covered short-track this year.

• 1610

The answer on the aboriginal sports is that for the first time ever we are covering Arctic winter games. We reviewed that in terms of covering it as an event, like we do the Olympics and the Pan Ams, and we decided that we couldn't do it what we felt was justice. Instead we decided to spend the money we had set aside in the budget on a documentary. The other reason is that I wanted to get it into prime time. So that's why.

Mr. John Solomon: Maybe one other quick question. I've never seen amateur golf on TV, Canadian women's amateur or Canadian men's amateur. Is that a possibility some time in the future?

Ms. Nancy Lee: Everything's a possibility, but we have to set priorities. At this stage, when we do the amateur, particularly we're looking for amateur sports that are leading into the amateur games.

Mr. John Solomon: Thank you.

[Translation]

The Chair: Ms. St-Hilaire.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire (Longueuil, BQ): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I also thank all our witnesses.

You have put in a lot of work into amateur sports, I think. I don't know if it's because of the Mills report, but, in any case, it is timely. I think you can be proud of the efforts that are being made.

Maybe it isn't possible to know as early as this afternoon how the schedule is the reflection of the efforts that were made in the area of amateur sports, because you talk about magazines and programs on athletes, but I'd eventually like to know what is going on with the schedule.

The CBC's mandate is to educate in amateur sports, whether curling or any other sport, whether it's Saturdays or Sundays during peak period. Now, what I hear about amateur sports athletes is that people would like to see more sports, and I include myself. The program Franc jeu and the others are all good programs, but I don't consider that they are necessarily amateur sport programs. In any case, it's not enough. It's good for the athletes and their visibility, but that's not what will necessarily lead us to an appreciation of the sporting disciplines.

So would you be able to tell us, perhaps through our researcher, what the scheduling is for amateur sport programs? You mentioned 120 to 180 hours, but what sports are we talking about? Ms. Lee mentioned priorities, but what are your priorities? What sports do these apply to? Synchronized swimming? There are sports we never get to see.

You have made efforts to get women interested. I for one will never watch sumo wrestling, and that is probably not how you will attract women. So I'd perhaps like to know that the statistics are for what was done in amateur sport.

There is one program which was appreciated, I think. It was called Le lys d'or. I don't know if this was a CBC or TVA program, but I think the athletes appreciated it.

I don't know if you have anything in view to promote the athletes during the Olympic Games. If they win a medal, everyone likes them and they get a hero's welcome. If they don't win any, you never near about them and things are hard for them after that. So, I was wondering if you had any ideas in that area.

Mr. Daniel Asselin: For the first question, I will give an answer somewhat on the lines I gave before: it's always a matter of money and choice. When you say you don't like sumo wrestling, I can understand you. But, at the same time, a lot of people don't like judo or water-polo.

That's why I am saying it is a matter of choice and money. If I show two hours of women's water-polo, unfortunately, very few people will watch. On the other hand, if I have something on the young women on the Canadian water-polo team—this team's story is actually rather extraordinary and we are preparing something on it—that program will draw more viewers than simply putting the sport on for two hours. I am sure of that.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: [Editor's note: Inaudible]

Mr. Daniel Asselin: It is a matter of money.

The same thing for judo. We are going to have the Canadian Judo Championships. If you don't like judo, you don't go. However, in Quebec, four children from the same family are going to be participating in the Canadian Judo Championships and two of them have the chance to go to Sydney. That is an extraordinary story. I am sure, once again, that the people will watch that show and learn more about judo than if I had broadcast a judo match for two hours.

The second question was on Le Lys d'or. I agree with you that it was wonderful. The concept belongs to an individual, with whom we are negotiating the purchase of the concept. It does not belong to us; an individual created it. Everything depends on the price. Will this person sell it to us at a reasonable price? It remains to be seen.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: You can ask the federal government for money.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Proud.

Mr. George Proud (Hillsborough, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

• 1615

Welcome, Mr. Asselin and Ms. Lee.

I want to ask a question. You mentioned in your presentation the cooperation you have with other networks. The most recent CRTC decision regarding CTV's acquisition of Norstar disallowed the Canada Games and

[Translation]

the Quebec Games

[English]

as public benefits. TSN-RDS's proposed commitment would have broadcast 125 hours on TSN-RDS for the 2003, 2005, and 2007 Canada Games. While the commission indicated that it expects to continue with this level of coverage, there's some question as to whether this full commitment is required.

In light of this, how would CBC or SRC react to their potential involvement in covering the Canada Games? More specifically, what level of coverage would the CBC-SRC be prepared to provide to the Canada Games over and above what it used to provide in the television package?

Ms. Nancy Lee: We'd be very keen to cover the Canada Games. Our interpretation is a bit different. We feel it's still a requirement, although it's not to be counted as a benefit. If in fact there is an opportunity to cover it on CBC, we would do it in an instant.

You asked the question about how we would cover it. I'll speak on the English side. Given that we're not on for 24 hours a day as a sports network, I would suggest that we would go forward with a partnership with a cable network so that a quantity of hours could be seen on the cable station and a quantity of hours in prime time could be over the main channel. That's how we've covered it in the past.

As you probably know, conventional airwaves go further than the cable ones do at this point in time, so we're very keen. At the amateur awards we spoke to the Canada Games Council. When we appeared at the CRTC in December, we spoke at that time as well. If it should ever come up on the table again, we'd be at the table to talk to them.

Mr. George Proud: Thank you.

The Chair: Ms. Jennings.

[Translation]

Ms. Marlene Jennings (Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Asselin and Ms. Lee. I have a couple of questions and I will try to keep it short.

In the first place, I would like to have your definition of amateur sport and professional sport. I was surprised to hear you say that curling, for you, is a professional sport.

In the second place, it seems that it is not your policy to cover sport at the regional level. I would like to know why, because I find that very important.

In the third place, I would like to know what guidelines you follow to decide which sports you will cover at the national level, because it seems that your policy is to cover only national amateur sports. How do you choose which sports you will cover?

Once you have made your choices, how do you reach the conclusion which you reached, Mr. Asselin? You are convinced that there would not be an audience for water polo. Nevertheless, you think you would be able to capture the attention of Canadians by broadcasting a story in which the players are women. Therefore, I suppose that there is a more objective consideration, or that past experience in broadcasting certain sports has shown this or allows you to assume this. In fact, someone from the outside who had the same information could reach more or less the same conclusion as you.

The example of soccer in Montreal comes to mind. This sport has attracted public interest for years, perhaps because its fans come from extremely diverse ethno-cultural backgrounds. I myself remember that, in the 1970s when the soccer World Cup games were being played, you could not go into a coffee shop without finding a crowd of people, because you needed to be able to pick up the retransmission of the satellite broadcast in order to watch the games.

• 1620

This makes me wonder how you reach your decisions and whether it is a matter of money, as you explained, as far as soccer is concerned: that is, that there is a package, that it is their choice, etc. Nor should we forget about regional soccer which, I am convinced, could attract a Canadian audience, although I may be mistaken.

Thank you.

You can see the effect of cultural communities; we use our hands a great deal.

Mr. Daniel Asselin: I will not answer your first question, since I do not have much time.

Ms. Marlene Jennings: Fine, you can send us the answer.

Mr. Daniel Asselin: No. You asked me what distinction we make between amateur sport and professional sport. There is a very fine line between the two. Various scholars have attempted to determine where one ends and the other begins. For many years, it was a simple matter: professional sport was the sport in which one made money. A person who did not make money was in amateur sport. By the way, I abhor the word “amateur”, because it implies amateurish, while amateur sports are practised by very skilled people.

That having been said, since the distinction is no longer made on the basis of whether or not a person earns money, it is hard for me to give you a precise answer to the question. We could debate this for a long time.

Ms. Marlene Jennings: That would be fine with me. However, Mr. Asselin, even if you are unable to answer this today, I assume that you have something in writing and that, over the years, you have developed certain criteria for considering whether a sport is amateur or professional, even if there is only a fine distinction between the two. I accept that you do not have the information here today, but I would like to obtain it.

Mr. Daniel Asselin: In that case, the answer is simple: a professional sport is one in which you make money; an amateur sport is one in which you do not earn money.

With regard to regional coverage...

[English]

The Chair: Excuse me, I have to interrupt. If someone earns money, they are considered professional.

Ms. Marlene Jennings: Track and field shouldn't be part of that.

The Chair: Are you telling me that, for example, the major junior hockey league in Canada would be considered a professional league, where they get something like $40 a week?

Mr. Daniel Asselin: At one time, the purity,

[Translation]

the distinction between amateur sport and professional sport was well defined. You earned money in one, and you did not earn money in the other. This is no longer true today. There are difficulties, as we all know. When Donovan Bailey wins a gold medal in track and field, this is said to be worth millions of dollars for him. Is he still an amateur athlete? Is he a professional athlete? Even we are unable to answer this at the current time.

[English]

The Chair: In following Ms. Jennings' point.... We won't press you today, but I think it would be useful for all of us to understand the definition you use that would allow you to say “Here's our 120 hours of amateur sport coverage. Here's why we classify these programs or these projects as amateur; it's to get us to 120.” What is your next 60 projected? Even though many of us have been sitting here for a couple of years, I think the notion that curling was no longer considered an amateur sport came as a revelation to most of us today.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Can I clarify that? We can provide you that information.

Ms. Marlene Jennings: Thank you.

Ms. Nancy Lee: We make priorities where it's based on criteria. We'll get to that.

In terms of the curling and the confusion you have, this goes back to our colleagues in other broadcasting and the CRTC. I think what Daniel is trying to express is that there's confusion out there in terms of how CBC identifies it, how the CRTC identifies it, how possibly your committee identifies it. It's a tough one. We will provide the criteria and I think you will see some clarity in that. It may not answer all the questions you have, but there are criteria of how we pick that 120, for sure.

The Chair: That would be useful for all of us.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Just for the record, I really didn't think curling was.... I should have been.... It's tough. People say, “There are a million viewers. How can that be amateur?” Just because you get 100,000 for diving and a million for curling.... For the record, it's up in the air.

• 1625

I also want to clarify. We do have a regional policy, and it's not to cover T-ball in Hamilton. We do look at the events that we cover in Canada and we say that we did X in B.C., we did X in Alberta, we go across, we go to the north, we go to the east.... I know we don't do a very good job there, but the reason—

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: My question is next.

The Chair: You're next.

Ms. Nancy Lee: We did a professional skins in P.E.I. It was professional, it was men's, but it was in P.E.I. This is all the criteria we use as to where we're going. We covered the world championships in canoeing and kayaking, for a number of reasons, but I can tell you that it cost us a bundle, and we did it because we hadn't been down to the Maritimes.

We do consider it. We don't do the best job we should, but that's what I feel is our regional.... We look at it, we map it out, where we have been.... We do consider it, that's for sure.

We will get back to you on that criteria, for sure.

The Chair: That was excellent questioning.

Ms. Wayne.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Thank you.

I'm glad you referred to the maritime provinces. I happen to have the Calgary Flames' AHL team in my city. When I'm home, I'm there, and that is professional, I know. When I get up to do the macarena, it's not professional whatsoever, but I keep trying, Dennis.

The Chair: You look pretty professional.

Mr. John Solomon: It's also not televised.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: I want to say that there are a lot of events that I would love to see the CBC televising. For instance, just this past week in Saint John we had the national curling championships for the deaf. If you could have seen them.... I'll tell you, it would have been wonderful for them and for their families all across this country to have seen them. When they want someone to brush they can't hear each other, so they have to make motions. It was absolutely beautiful.

There are so many sports that we have back home. I want to say this. My grandson plays hockey and they just won their championship. He's in junior high school. It meant so much to him. It was shown on our local cable; they went after it for us. Shaw Cable is now there, and that's going to be competition in the maritime provinces, probably to our CBC. But I'll say this, Mr. Chairman. There is a need for CBC to be there, in every region of Canada, when it comes to basketball, to hockey.... And the reason I say this is that it encourages young people to get involved—

The Chair: Absolutely.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: When they're involved in sports, it's much better than some of the other involvement they could be in. So whatever we have to do, you have to look at that, you really do. It just can't be focused in the larger centres. It has to be right across the country.

Ms. Nancy Lee: I have a very brief anecdote. I spoke to Carleton alumni last week. A fellow who was tending bar in the room I spoke in came up to me and said he used to swim, that he was from St. John's. He said he just wanted to thank the CBC because we put swimming on the air.

So we are attempting it, but as you well know, in terms of.... I always look at it as us spending taxpayers' money doing amateur sport, and I feel the job has been given to me and the people who work with me to set the priorities. We simply can't do everything that every Canadian would want us to do. I like to hear the feedback in terms of what works and what doesn't. We're trying.

The Chair: Could I just intervene here, with your permission, colleagues?

You made a statement, Ms. Lee, that you're spending taxpayers' money. But you also receive revenue from other organizations, right? For example, in regard to NHL professional sport, these people pay you. How do you mean you're spending professional...? When you sell advertisements on the air, you're receiving private sector money. I don't understand it when you say you're spending taxpayers' money, yet you have all kinds of incredible revenues coming in from the private sector as well.

Ms. Nancy Lee: A lot of incredible revenue, one would say—I don't know if our sales department would say it—comes in for hockey, for professional sports. It doesn't come in for swimming, diving, and weightlifting, but what we do is we put those events on the air. In terms of the commercials we run within that amateur programming, the audience isn't large enough for the sponsors to pay us a lot of money, and it never meets the cost of the production.

• 1630

The Chair: Could you provide for the committee information on what you have received?

I think Ms. Wayne has touched something here that's pretty important for us to understand. If it's united, this committee can have some constructive influence, not just on the minister of sport for Canada—who is very friendly and sympathetic to our work here—but could maybe, as a collectivity, as an all-party group.... If there's one thing about this exercise here...our decisions around amateur sport have the support of all parties in the House of Commons. This may therefore be an area in which we could lean on either the Minister of Canadian Heritage or the Minister of Finance to provide the CBC with some added resources, so that those amateur projects that Ms. Wayne, Mr. Solomon, and others have touched upon could get a little bit more treatment.

Could you give us an idea of what you would charge, for example, or what revenue you would expect when you sell off a couple of hours or three hours to, say, an NHL project or some other project for which you're getting private sector commercial sponsorship?

Ms. Nancy Lee: If you're asking me if we'd like more money, I'll—

The Chair: No, it's not more money so that it can go into professional sport or other programming. You mentioned in your brief here—and excuse me, colleagues—that you're doing an extra 60 hours under the latest CRTC recommendation. I calculate that to be eight minutes a day of additional amateur sport. If you figure that out over the period of 12 hours, that's like a minute of sport broadcasting. It doesn't seem to me to be a lot of additional coverage of amateur sport.

Ms. Nancy Lee: In terms of looking at it that way, I just go back to.... Maybe it's a bit internal. The responsibility that comes under me is just truly at the network, but I will get the answers at the local. In terms of what's on the network, it reflects the sport that we put on the air. Essentially the new schedule for us has been devoted to putting that programming on the air from noon to 6 p.m.

I know the figure sounds small, but I can tell you that the fact that we've been out there is huge to those associations because we've said their sports are not going to just be on television, but on the CBC. We cover the country and everybody can see those sports, so it means a lot to them. We could say it's still not good enough, but I think it's huge for us to have made that commitment.

And just for clarification, we made that suggestion as a recommendation to the CRTC. It wasn't imposed on us. We wanted to do it.

The Chair: We understand that.

Ms. Nancy Lee: We presented it to the CRTC.

In terms of the figures, I'd just have to check with my colleagues in terms of what's on the public record and what's not. I actually think they are, but I would want to check in case there's a competition between what we charge for 30 seconds and what the others charge. I don't think there is, but I'd like to check on it.

The Chair: I'm sure you have a sales kit.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Yes, I believe that's the case.

The Chair: Okay, pardon me.

Mr. Proud, you had a short question.

Mr. George Proud: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Just as a question, I want to go to professional sports for a moment.

How do you see your decision to reduce your broadcasts of professional sports affecting the market for broadcast rights? Are the private sector broadcasters picking up the properties? And after all this is said and done, do you think Canadians will be able to see the same amount of professional sport on free television versus pay television?

[Translation]

Mr. Daniel Asselin: Let me tell you about the problem we are currently experiencing with the Montreal Expos baseball club. At the CRTC hearings last year, private broadcasters in Quebec came in great numbers to say that Radio-Canada should get out of professional sport. The only professional sport that we still broadcast today is La soirée du Hockey, the Saturday night hockey game. It is a tradition and I do not think it will be stopped. We also do two small tennis tournaments in Toronto and Montreal: the Omnium canadien (Canadian Open). That is all that we cover in terms of professional sport.

Last year, on Friday, July 23—I remember it very clearly—we made a public announcement to the effect that we would no longer be covering baseball. Private broadcasters appearing before the CRTC had insisted so strongly on our getting out, that we did get out of it.

I cannot speak for them, but they did not seize this opportunity that we left them. The baseball property is there, it is available. No private network in Quebec has decided to pick it up. It is a business decision that they have to make for themselves, but they are not alone; there is still competition.

• 1635

There are still two private networks and a specialized network. None of them chose to do baseball this year. So the situation has definitely changed because, for the time being, no one is going to broadcast the Expos games, for example.

[English]

Ms. Nancy Lee: Just to follow up on that, if I have my days right, I think the decision last week was very important. It's important to have competition in the marketplace so that as many Canadians can see sport as possible.

There are two examples of sports that we have recently dropped. We dropped F1 because it became too expensive.

The Chair: What is F1?

Ms. Nancy Lee: Formula 1 auto racing, and the Grand Prix from Montreal. No other conventional network picked it up, so it's on TSN. However, we are also not doing CART—which means the Indy races at Toronto and Vancouver—but Global has picked those up. So it just depends on the package and the value and whether or not another network thinks there is worth to it.

Mr. George Proud: So do you think Canadians will see the same amount of professional sport as they had on free TV, rather than on pay channels?

Ms. Nancy Lee: Based on last week's decision, I believe so, yes.

The Chair: Mr. Mark, and then we'll go to Mr.—

Mr. Inky Mark: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

There's no doubt that public broadcasting is at a crossroads, and that includes sports broadcasting.

Have you asked Canadians what they expect from sports or from amateur sport? What kind of sports do Canadians want to watch? If you have asked them, how does this data impact on how you plan your broadcast programming?

Ms. Nancy Lee: We haven't done that. In fact, we're going through an internal...that will actually get to that point in terms of.... I'm not too sure how we're going to do it—whether it's through poll or focus groups—but it's to deal with our Olympic coverage and our amateur.... As Daniel stated off the top, the key for us is that for two and a half weeks everybody goes crazy to watch the Olympics. After that, they forget amateur sport. We want to figure out how to remind them that amateur sport is on for 52 weeks of the year. It's in the works, but I think it will be after Sydney before we get to it.

Mr. Inky Mark: If I can ask one more, have you looked at using the Internet as maybe a parallel system to certainly increase your time to broadcast amateur sports?

Ms. Nancy Lee: Very much so. Daniel spoke in terms of the relationship that we have with the COA on amateur sport. We're just a few steps behind on the English Internet, but it's going to happen for sure.

The Chair: Ms. Jennings.

[Translation]

Ms. Marlene Jennings: I have a short question.

I would like to get a clear understanding of the meaning of the increase in original amateur sport programming. To put this in context, I would like to know how many hours of programming you have each week, for example. Secondly, I would like to know the total number of hours that are set aside for sports coverage. Thirdly, I want to know the total number of hours that are set aside for original sport programming. I think that this information would allow us to put amateur sport coverage in perspective, according to the definition that you are going to give us. Thank you. That's all.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Proud, you had a short question before—

Mr. George Proud: Yes, I just wonder if you can break even broadcasting amateur sport. Is the revenue there?

Ms. Nancy Lee: No, it's not.

Mr. Daniel Asselin: Except for the Olympics, and nothing else.

The Chair: Mrs. Wayne.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Mr. Chairman, you were saying the money isn't there.

When I was mayor of Saint John, I brought in the CFL. Now, whether you like it or not, Imperial Tobacco and Purdy Crawford sponsored that for me. I also brought in the World Chess Festival, with grandmasters from all over the world. That was very different, and it was the first time ever in Canada. We had all kinds of money, millions of dollars that sponsors gave us. We did the Canada Summer Games, and when we finished with the Canada Summer Games, we were the first—the first—municipality to have $1.5 million left over. I think that's how much there was, but it may have been $2.5 million.

The sponsors are out there, but you have to go get them. You have to approach them. I honestly believe there is money there, Nancy, I really do.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Cut me off if I go on too long.

The Chair: I will.

Ms. Nancy Lee: The World Track and Field Championship is the third-largest sporting event in the world after the Olympics and soccer's World Cup. I said before that they wouldn't have happened in Edmonton with the Royal Bank.

For Edmonton to have that event in their city, they required a Canadian broadcaster to broadcast the world championships from Seville. So we and Edmonton went over to get the rights, but they were asking for so much money that we couldn't afford to pay. There was no way we could afford it, and they couldn't afford it, so we went to the Royal Bank and they came in.

• 1640

That happens so infrequently outside the two and a half weeks of magic during the Olympics. I've been in the job for three and a half years, and it's been very tough to attract that kind of money. I think we could probably learn from you.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Thank you.

The Chair: Colleagues, do you have any other questions?

Monsieur Asselin and Mademoiselle Lee, we want to thank you for coming here today and bringing us up to date, but there's one little challenge I would like to present to the CBC. All of us in this country are facing a very difficult challenge with trying to organize the health care system so that it's sustainable. In front of our committee a year and a half ago, some of the best surgeons in Canada said if we could mobilize Canadians to become more physically active in sport, for every 10% additional to the foundation right now of about 29% or 39%, it could put downward pressure on the health care system to the tune of almost $5 billion a year.

Would it be possible for your department, because you have this extraordinary relationship with athletic leaders in our country, to see if you could produce and organize some testimonials in those spaces that are unsold on your network to encourage Canadians to become more physically fit or get more active and participate in sport? I'm not just talking about people our age but people of all ages, because we know and all the same doctors said for children who are involved in organized sport, their chances of academic achievement and their chances of enhanced social skills have been improved—the development of the whole person.

I think the CBC, especially the sports unit of CBC, without any cost, could really play an incredible leadership role in setting a standard, setting a benchmark, that quite frankly other networks might follow if you took up the lead.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Maybe we'll talk to your research staff. In addition to the doctors, did you have...? We have to get to society and figure out what's going to get them interested in going to swim every morning before they go to work or to school. Did people come and speak to you, between us and the doctors, about that fact?

The Chair: Yes. We'd be happy to supply you with all that information.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Okay, because if we know what's in people's minds and what would get them to participate, we can work with that.

The Chair: It's all available on the website. All the testimony is there. But we'd be happy to work with you on that. We feel CBC could play a terrific standard-bearer role that hopefully other networks would follow.

Thank you all very much for coming today.

Ms. Nancy Lee: Thank you.

The Chair: The meeting is adjourned.