In This Report:

As the new head of CanWest Global, Peter Viner looks to expand the network’s media holdings. p. 23

Cover montage index p. 24

Mintz on Asper p. 27

Brinton on Asper p. 28

CanWest history: an overview p. 30

Asper in Alberta: a fitting adieu p. 31

July 1996. Setting: The Calgary Delta Chelsea Hotel. Cast: CanWest Global, Craig Broadcasting, WIC Western International Communications, Baton Broadcasting, ctv, cbc, various and sundry production types, all of whom gathered together to promote, protest, and/or pontificate on applications from CanWest and Craig for a new Alberta tv licence.

It was, at the end of four days, Izzy Asper who was allowed the last word by the crtc. Given the subsequent history, the text is interesting. Out of context but given the content, it acts as a fitting wrap to the CanWest 20th. Following are selected excerpts from Asper’s closing statement to the commission.

‘We recognize that we have put before you much more than just a question of whether or not to license another Calgary or Edmonton television station and to which applicant it should go. We recognize that we have posed some larger issues.

‘We have challenged you, probably as no other commission panel has been challenged since the landmark decision of several decades ago to license the first commercial television network, the ctv.

‘We are very proud to have been able to grow under your tutelage to the stage where we are large enough and strong enough to, in 22 years, be able to pose this challenge.

‘And howsoever you decide these applications, you know that this will be another landmark decision in the history of the broadcasting industry in Canada. It will have a profound, significant impact, howsoever you decide on the future of this industry into the new century.

‘So I am sure all of us wish you well and Godspeed in your deliberations.

‘On a personal note, I feel very privileged to have been allowed to come to the day where I could take part in proceedings like this. I am well aware of the onerous and, I hope, awesome new responsibilities and the risks that we at CanWest – and, indeed, Craig – would assume if we were approved in the new mandates we seek.

‘Finally, if I may, in an ecumenical way, pay a salute to those who opposed our application and the implications of what it means to Canada. It is trite, but it is very true, and all of us know it, that we live in the greatest country in the world.

‘Our broadcast industry has a continuing role in making it even better and keeping it that way.

‘So to those who observed these proceedings, the clash of ideas and the concepts and the visions that took place here in the last three or four days is not personal, nor is it malicious, nor is it vindictive. At the root of all of the people who have appeared before you is our common commitment to build, to change, to question the status. Again, to make it better.

‘So those of us maybe who came through these doors four days ago as combatants, I can assure you, Mr. Chairman, we leave this room as colleagues, ever committed to the objective of making the Canadian broadcasting system better.’