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Canada

By MARC YOUNG

While the federal government asserts
that cuts from Ottawa have nothing to do
with the dramatic “paring down” of
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation ser-
vices revealed Dec. 4, observers are angrily
linking Tory policy and the CBC crisis.

Upwards of $100 million will be coming
off the CBC’s $1.5-billion budget, with as
many as 1,200 jobs eliminated. Layoffs are
scheduled to take effect at the beginning of
April.

Last year’s federal budget demanded that
the corporation slash $140 million over
three years. CBC president Gerard Vielleux
noted at a Dec. 5 press conference that “we
hope to reach that by next year.”

Ten of 17 regional stations will be cut,
according to a report on The National, in-
cluding offices in Windsor, Sydney, Corner
Brook, Goose Bay, Calgary, Saskatoon, and
Sept-Iles, Rimouski, and Matane, in
Quebec. CBLT in Toronto is reported to be
going, and in what critics are calling an
attack on Ontario’s francophone com-
munity, Toronto’s CBLFT has closed.

__ The award-winning program Monitor is
among the victims of Communications Min-
ister Marcel Masse’s axe.

Ken Hopper, chief negotiator for broad-
casting personnel at the Canadian Union of
Public Employees, told the Tribune that
CUPE, which represents around 5,000 CBC
workers in Quebec and English Canada, is
presently preparing a legal challenge to the
corporation move.

Hopper says that among other things, the
cuts contravene the corporation mandate,
according to which it has to effectively serve
communities across the country.

At press time, CUPE did not know the
specific number of members who might be
directly affected by the staff reductions.
Hopper did note his organization’s dis-
pleasure in learning about CBC directors’
decision via the media, rather than through
a communication to the union.

Ontario’s NDP government was also
quick with a reaction, as the minister respon-
sible for francophone affairs said the plan,
and specifically the CBLFT closing, “bor-
ders on disaster at the cultural level.”
Premier Bob Rae was also sharply critical.
At press time, Queen’s Park was reportedly
considering its own court challenge.

CBC cuts slash francophone services

Legal challenge prepared

On the day of the announcement, a
shadow of gloom hung over the CBLFT
newsroom in Toronto, where reporters and
staff slumped in chairs absorbing the shock
and sometimes craned their necks to get a
look at Vielleux on the television.

“The Conservatives have been trying to
kill the CBC for a long time,” said union
steward Denis Boucher. But the bilingual

reporter noted that while Tory policy com-
pelled the corporation to address scarce
resources with some cuts, “I don’t under-
stand why (they were) made here.

“CBC French is a tool to preserve
French. You have to able to relate to some-
thing in French on TV” if you want to main-
tain and strengthen the language, he said.

In future, francophone Ontario viewers

will be served through Ottawa, which to date
has concentrated on coverage of Hull and
the capital area.

Beyond the general charge that the cuts
are just the latest in a series of federal
policies designed to dismantle Canada’s
public institutions, some observers are em-
phasizing the politics of the CBLFT closing
in particular. Briefly, they note the oddity of
a government that states a federalist
preference to a two-independent-nation
resolution of the constitutional crisis, and
then actively undermines French Canadian
culture outside of Quebec.

Working to en
trains over th

Merry Christmas |
to our members and friends

United Food & Commercial

Workers Union of
British Columbia
Local 1518

Brooke Sundin, President

Season’s Greetings

from the membership of
Vancouver United
Transportation Union

Local 701

Jack Allard, Secretary Treasurer

sure the safety of
e holiday season.

B.C. Provincial

"In unity there is strength"

from

Council of
Carpenters

Season s Greetings

to the labour movement

| \_—~_ > United
\ ; _Fishermen

7" and Allied
Workers’
Union
Local 1

Pacific Tribune, December 17, 1990 « 9

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