If the CRTC doesn’t do something fast to get Canadian content on this country’s airwaves, the homegrown film and TV industry will continue its decline, says the Writers Guild of Canada.

‘We can’t go on this way,’ the executive director of the WGC, Maureen Parker, told Playback from Los Angeles, where she was observing the Writers Guild of America labor negotiations.

Next year ‘is a critical year for our industry. If at the end of 2008 the CRTC does nothing to support the creation of Canadian content, it will be a different industry,’ says Parker, adding that the writers strike in the U.S. will have little impact on Canadian screenwriters unless they are members of the American guild.

In the meantime, the WGC is directing its members to not work for any ‘American engagers,’ and in a recent release voiced its support of the WGA, noting, ‘their fight is our fight.’

Although Parker is keenly watching events in the U.S., and hopes Canadian broadcasters will use the WGA strike – and vanishing new episodes of imported shows – as a reason to promote homegrown programming, she’s much more concerned about what’s happening at the CRTC.

‘We have our own industry, we have our own concerns. What’s pressing for us is whether the CRTC is going to respect the Broadcasting Act,’ she says.

On Nov. 19, the federal regulator begins hearings into the multi-billion-dollar purchase of Alliance Atlantis Communications by CanWest Global Communications and a private-equity arm of New York investment bank Goldman Sachs. The WGC opposes the deal because, as Parker sees it, it means that 13 of Canada’s specialty channels will become branches of an American bank.

The WGC is also awaiting the federal regulator’s review of the Canadian Television Fund, commissioned after cable giants Shaw Communications and Videotron spurred an industry crisis last winter by stopping their monthly payments to the fund, alleging poor management. The CRTC report was to be completed this fall, but has been delayed pending public hearings early in the new year.

‘We want stable and enhanced funding for CTF. We believe [the cable companies’] concerns are ridiculous,’ says Parker.

The WGC is particularly worried about the future of Canadian drama after the CRTC’s 1999 Television Policy allowed Canadian broadcasters to satisfy their Canadian-content requirements with lifestyle, magazine and other cheaply produced programming.

‘Dramatic programming has plummeted since 1999. We wonder if the CRTC is going to do anything at all,’ says Parker. ‘If we want a country where we have our own content, then we have to pay for it. Broadcasters don’t air Canadian content unless they have to.’

In 1998, private English over-the-air broadcasters spent 5.1% of their advertising revenue ($73 million) on Canadian drama. By 2001, spending dropped to 4% ($62 million), and in 2006, it was just 2.3% ($40 million) – the lowest percentage in nine years, according to the WGC.

Spending on drama by English-Canadian private broadcasters has fallen dramatically (30.4%), while their spending on non-Canadian drama has increased (40.6%), says the guild.

The WGC joins an increasingly loud chorus blasting both the CRTC and Heritage Minister Josée Verner for thus far not doing enough to protect Canadian content. In late October, 18 unions and associations – mainly from Quebec – asked Verner to pressure the CRTC to enforce the cultural objectives of the Broadcasting Act more rigorously. They also maintain that CRTC head Konrad von Finckenstein’s public discourse is confusing, because he talks about the need to protect Canadian culture, yet he’s also a fan of deregulation.

‘We’re happy about von Finckenstein’s remarks regarding supporting Canadian content, but now we want to see the next step. We need to see the actual practical application,’ Parker says. The WGC wants private conventional broadcasters to spend 7% of their advertising revenues on Canadian drama.

‘The creative community isn’t going to put up with it anymore. The system is out of whack, and it’s not healthy. It won’t lead to good programming,’ says Parker, adding that she feels it would be irresponsible to encourage new talent to enter the industry right now. ‘There’s just no employment,’ she says.

The WGC represents 1,800 screenwriters across the country.

www.wgc.ca