Barry Kiefl is president of Canadian Media Research.

In June of this year, the Parliamentary committee responsible for broadcasting policy issued an 800-page report on the broadcasting system called Our Cultural Sovereignty: The Second Century of Canadian Broadcasting. The report makes many worthwhile points, but its underlying research is problematic and this is probably why the report has met with a lukewarm response. With Parliament due to respond on or before Nov. 7, it may be useful to take a look at some of the inconsistencies contained in the report.

First, in terms of television there is a misunderstanding about fragmentation and reaching mass audiences. Audience fragmentation has not affected the audience reach of major TV networks, as the report claims. The weekly, or at least monthly, audience reach of networks such as CTV, CBC and TVA still often approaches 100% of the population. Fragmentation means that the audience for any individual program will be smaller but major networks will still reach most viewers at least some of the time.

TV viewing levels have skyrocketed in the past 24 months, according to Nielsen, negating the conclusion in the report that viewing levels have not changed over the years. SARS and 9/11 have affected our lifestyles, restricting travel and increasing the amount of time we spend at home, available to watch TV. Of course, power blackouts put a crimp on how much TV one can watch, as Ontario found out in August.

The report usually analyzes only primetime data, stating that ‘most viewing has taken place during the evening hours.’ There is some recognition that non-primetime hours are important, but most of the subsequent analysis reverts to the hours 7-11 p.m.

One of the classic myths in Canadian TV is that most viewing occurs in primetime, 7-11 p.m. A major problem arises, if one analyzes only primetime viewing patterns. Most viewing does not take place during the hours of 7-11 p.m. In 2002/03 this four-hour time period accounts for only about 35% of viewing.

There is a reference in Chapter 4 about the number of households watching TV in primetime, but the reference is incorrect; these numbers are the number of people, not the number of households watching.

The statement in the report that most people watch only six to seven channels is only true if one is referring to a one-week period. The longer the time period, the more channels people watch, a phenomenon that has been well documented. This is another one of the myths about TV that many in the industry carry around with them. According to Nielsen people meter data, the average cable TV/DTH subscriber watched more than 40 different channels in the calendar year 2002, not counting diginets.

The growing use of the Internet versus TV is exaggerated. The Statistics Canada survey, which measures average weekly hours spent with the Internet and which is the source used in the committee’s report, includes usage at home and at work, school, etc., but this is not mentioned in the text. TV viewing hours are measured at home only. According to various sources, less than half of Internet use is at home, which means that TV use greatly exceeds Internet home use, a fact worth mentioning. Incidentally, this is true even among younger groups. Teens, for example, spend about three times more hours watching TV than using the Internet at home.

The committee’s analysis of viewing to Canadian content is especially vexing. The analysis is based on the 7-11 p.m. time period and therefore tells only half or less than half the story, given that primetime accounts for only about one-third of TV viewing.

Primetime is when private Canadian stations concentrate their efforts on U.S. programming and generating ad revenue. Thus CBC performs well in comparative terms. Are we to assume the CBC doesn’t need an increase in its budget, one of the recommendations of the report? What about the rest of the viewing day? If one calculates the Cancon audience share of CTV on a whole day basis, it is larger than CBC’s, approximately 50% larger. The relative percentage calculations presented in the report on a 7-11 p.m. basis conceal this important fact. If one makes the basis for a percentage calculation small and obscure enough, almost any spin can be put on data.

Probably the most important data in the report is presented in Chapter 4 (Figure 4.17 and Figure 4.18), yet there is nothing more than a few descriptive sentences in this section about the contents of these charts. No mention is made of the fact that Canadian pay/specialty channels, according to Figure 4.17, accounted for more than 50% of the audience for Canadian drama and comedy in English TV in 2001.

Moreover, the fact that private conventional TV stations in both English and French TV dominate the audience for Canadian news is also passed over with only a brief mention. Both are incredibly important findings that are virtually ignored in the report.

If the viewing data relating to French TV drama in the report is wrong, and independent, published reports indicate that it is, readers of the committee’s report will be left with a very mistaken impression about the state of French TV.

The viewing data relating to French TV drama/comedy in the report appears to be in error and readers of the committee’s report could be left with a very mistaken impression about the state of French TV.

The report states that in 2000/01, ‘surprisingly only 26% of the drama watched by francophones was Canadian.’ First, the accompanying chart does not say that this is francophone viewing but French TV. Graphics in the report refer to English TV and French TV, respectively, but the accompanying text erroneously says that these charts refer to English-speaking and French-speaking Canadians. This mistake is repeated often in the report.

Statistics Canada, which uses the same audience data used by the CRTC, reports that viewing to French TV drama is approximately double that reported in the committee report, that is, about 50%. Otherwise, how does one explain the huge success of teleromans, which is a finding highlighted in the report.

The Canadian Association of Broadcasters made a submission to the committee based on Statistics Canada data which showed that in 1999 some 49% of the viewing to drama/comedy on French TV was to Canadian drama/comedy. It seems unlikely that this would be cut in half only a year later. Statistics Canada’s published analysis of the 2000 and the 2001 data showed that just under 50% of francophones’ viewing to drama/comedy (including viewing to English TV) was to Canadian drama/comedy.

Oddly, the report twice claims that there has been a 450% increase in viewing to Canadian drama on English TV. The claim of a 450% increase in viewing to Canadian drama is very misleading and the cited source is incorrect. It is counterintuitive, the basis for the calculation is unorthodox and the source data is questionable or at least in apparent contradiction with Statistics Canada data.

Over the years the definitions of drama/comedy have changed and today the category contains programs, such as animation and sketch comedy, that were not included in analyses done 15 or 20 years ago. Statistics Canada data shows that the viewing share of Canadian drama, adjusting for the changes in definitions, has increased from about 7% to 8% of all drama viewing to about 10% to 11% over the years in question. This is an increase, but far more modest than the claimed 450%.

The report states ‘that it is now possible for Canadians to watch just Canadian programming.’ How was supply of programming measured? Was each hour of The Weather Network counted as Canadian programming, i.e., it equaled or surpassed the CBC’s contribution to the supply of Canadian content? The point is that there is a great deal more foreign programming on our screens than this analysis shows.

Measuring the supply of programming is probably more complex than measuring audiences. There are several key obstacles: Which networks are to be counted in program supply and is a network that covers 100% of the population to be given the same weight as one that is only available to a fraction of Canadian homes?

Our Cultural Sovereignty is an important document and it contains many valuable suggestions for the future of Canadian broadcasting. However, if policy analysis is to be taken seriously and acted upon, then the underlying research must be sound and reflect the true state of the Canadian broadcasting system.

-www.parl.gc.ca/InfoComDoc/37/2/HERI/Studies/Reports/herirp02-e.htm