Culture may not have featured prominently in Prime Minister Paul Martin’s victory speech, and Minister of Canadian Heritage Helene Chalifour Scherrer will not be returning to Parliament Hill, but when key cultural issues for the film and television industry do come up, they will be hard for the Liberals to ignore this time around, according to industry insiders.

The Liberals’ minority status in the House of Commons may be the best result for industry groups, many of which were concerned about the fate of the film and television industry under a Conservative government.

‘Power is diffused in a minority situation and therefore public opinion becomes more important,’ says Ian Morrison of the Friends of Canadian Broadcasting. ‘The Bloc is completely solid on cultural issues as is the NDP, so there is a strange situation where this new parliament will be hung on a number of issues, but the preponderant opinion will be pro-Canadian culture.’

After the June 28 election stakeholders were quick to predict that the stronger cultural platforms of the NDP and the Bloc Quebecois will have increased influence over the new government, which could go a long way towards settling the ongoing debate on foreign ownership within the Liberal Party.

‘Now it’s time for the politicians to follow up on their promises to support culture… and make appointments that will protect and enhance Canadian cultural industries,’ says ACTRA national president Thor Bishopric.

The election campaigns stirred the film and television industry pot, causing related organizations across the country to join forces to push culture onto election agendas and to highlight the negative potential of a Conservative government, which, according to its policy handbook, supported ‘restructuring the CRTC’ and ‘relaxing foreign ownership rules on Canadian telecommunications and broadcast distribution’ if elected.

An informal coalition including major organizations such as the CFTPA, ACTRA, UDA, the CAB and the APFTQ pressured the heads of all the major parties to state clearly their policy on important cultural issues, and although the Conservative Party was the least responsive, the Liberal Party failed to take a stance on foreign-ownership issues.

A recent Ipsos-Reid survey indicated that at least 80% of Canadians want to keep Canadian cable properties in the hands of domestic companies.

‘There is an ongoing discussion within the government on [the foreign-ownership] issue,’ said Liberal Party spokesperson Peter Graham in the days leading up to the election. ‘It is a complex issue and something that is still being looked at by the government between departments.’The ongoing debate between Canadian Heritage, which is in favor of maintaining current foreign-ownership restrictions, and Industry Canada, which favors relaxing such restrictions, will likely be settled in favor of Heritage if the NDP and the Bloc push their cultural agendas in the House of Commons.

APFTQ director of communications Celine Pelletier says the Quebec producers association is confident the Bloc’s strong showing will be an asset in its efforts to push the government to side with Heritage on the issue of foreign ownership, an issue she says the APFTQ will be following very closely in the near future.

‘[Foreign ownership] is one of the main pillars in the whole system, and if we lose Canadian control over our own enterprise, the content will just fall away,’ says Pelletier. ‘We know the Bloc is very supportive of our position as are many Canadian associations in our sector.’

ACTRA national executive director Stephen Waddell is also confident influence from the NDP and Bloc will encourage the government to maintain existing restrictions.

‘Both the Bloc and the NDP have strong policies with respect to culture, and in particular are opposed to relaxing the rules on foreign ownership,’ he says. ‘We will be getting in touch with all four major parties, talking about the cultural agenda as soon as possible and trying to get culture on the agenda in this minority government, which one hopes will be more sympathetic on issues relative to cultural industries than in the past.’

The culture-first lobby will have an inside track this time around, as well, thanks to the fact that Brian Topp, executive director of ACTRA Toronto Performers, took a temporary leave to help run the NDP campaign as director of research.

On other key cultural issues in the election, such as the role of the CRTC and the CBC, the Liberals took a stronger stance.

‘The Liberal government will continue to support the roles of the CRTC in preserving and promoting Canadian identity in its efforts to continue to promote choice and diversity in Canadian broadcasting and telecommunications within the Canadian system,’ says Graham. ‘We certainly do believe in the importance of public investment in cultural industries… [and] there is a commitment to continue to support public broadcasting through the CBC.’

CFTPA president and CEO Guy Mayson says he was generally disappointed with the attention paid to culture in the election, but warmed up slightly to the Liberals when defeated Heritage Minister Scherrer took time away from her now-lost constituency in Quebec to speak at the recent Banff Television Festival. Scherrer was defeated in her riding of Louis-Hebert by Bloc candidate Roger Clavet.

‘We were encouraged that there was a fairly strong statement [from Scherrer] and obviously we got their attention, so we were pleased with that,’ says Mayson. ‘We think the whole production industry in general and the importance of the sector is not fully understood and we’re going to be working hard to raise that profile.’

Now industry organizations may be in a lobbying position to take advantage of what appears will be a more culture-friendly government than the last.

‘We have to make sure our gas tank is full because we have a lot of work to do,’ says Morrison.