Montreal: In two Orders-in-Council, the federal Cabinet has upheld the May 21 crtc decision to license four new French-language specialty channels, and asked the commission to evaluate the feasibility of a French-language performing arts specialty tv service in Canada. The cabinet has asked to crtc to report by the fall; meantime, the government has upheld the regulator’s decision to license four other French-track specialties, Canal Histoire, Canal Fiction, Canal Evasion and Canal Z.

In assessing the viability of a French arts channel, the commission will look at the current level of arts-related programming broadcast in French, cable capacity and other issues.

crtc spokesman Denis Carmel says at this point the commission has not determined how to proceed with the feasibility request. A meeting to discuss the issue is planned, and he says there are three options. ‘(We may) have an internal review if we feel we have enough evidence in our records to make a decision. The second option would be a public written process, a call for comments, or we could have oral public hearings.’

The orders-in-council are a response to a petition from cbc and others asking the federal government to refer the May 21 specialty tv licensing decisions back to the crtc for further review. cbc and the other petitioners maintained that, in denying a licence to Radio-Canada’s Reseau des Arts proposal, the crtc decision went counter to the objectives of the Broadcasting Act.

‘After a careful review of the petition, the Government of Canada has determined that the crtc decisions did not derogate from the objectives of the Broadcasting Act, which is the sole criterion for referring back a crtc decision,’ Heritage Minister Sheila Copps said in a prepared statement.

Other promoters are likely to emerge in the event of a full hearing on an arts specialty licence.

The Canadian Association of Broadcasters opposed the cbc’s request to Cabinet, calling the petition ‘a hope to salvage a flawed plan that calls for developing specialties to help strengthen the conventional networks.’

In a recent article published in La Presse, cab president Michael McCabe wrote that any new hearings on the issue of a French-language specialty arts service should be opened to competing applications from private broadcasters.

Radio-Canada says it is reviewing and improving on its rda application, done with partners Bell Media (20%) and France’s cultural broadcaster La Sept-ARTE (20%). src says it is open to adding additional partners including Tele-Quebec, which earlier declined an equity position in rda.

In its May 21 decision, the crtc raised the issue of rda’s high subscriber rate ($0.90), limited cable capacity in the French market, and impact on exisiting broadcasters, specifically Tele-Quebec. src says it is reviewing its subscriber fee rate proposal and looking at the export potential of selected programs.