The Canadian Cable Television Association applauds most of the crtc’s proposed policy for increasing the range of digital television services in English and French, as outlined at a public hearing Oct. 18.

The crtc recently conducted public consultations in which many francophone Canadians outside of Quebec expressed interest in a wider selection of French-language services. As a result, the regulator has proposed a policy that would have one minority-language service for every 10 majority-language services a cable system offers.

‘Under the crtc’s proposed policy, the cable industry would respond to this community interest by making approximately seven or eight minority official language specialty services available in most markets. Consumers in communities such as Edmonton, Winnipeg and Windsor could, if they choose, access an expanded choice of French-language services as part of their digital cable,’ said Janet Yale, ccta president and ceo.

But while the crtc proposed using census statistics on people with ‘knowledge’ of French to decipher which communities would be covered by the new policy, the ccta suggests using the same statistical measure employed by the federal government under the Official Languages Act.

The ccta also suggests that because digital capacity on small cable systems (serving fewer than 20,000 households and not affiliated with any of the four leading cablecos) will remain limited for the foreseeable future, they should be exempt from the policy. *-www.crtc.gc.ca

-www.ccta.ca