The CBC is in the ‘very early stages’ of talks to hand sales of its archives to the BBC, but does not plan to sell the material outright or make any cuts at home.

The deal, if approved, would see the Beeb act as a sales agent internationally and in Canada for the net’s voluminous radio and TV archives, according to CBC spokesperson Ruth-Ellen Soles.

‘This is strictly a business deal,’ says Soles, and a source of additional revenue. ‘CBC values our audio and visual library and we realize that it does document much of the last century of Canadian history, and we have absolutely no intention of selling or transferring this material to anybody.’

The Canadian Media Guild – which represents the bulk of CBC’s staff – had warned its members last month that the net was in talks with its British cousins and suggested in a release that jobs in Toronto could be in danger.

‘To my knowledge, no,’ says Soles, explaining that the Ceeb has only a small and ‘reactive’ sales team handling stock footage, not proper archive sales.

The net was also thought by some to be preparing to sell off the archives entirely.

CMG representative Glenn Gray now says the union is ‘somewhat assured’ about the deal, following a Nov. 25 meeting with CBC management.

‘Our big concern was they didn’t even talk to us,’ he says, complaining that the network did not bring them ‘into the tent’ earlier. CMG and the network fought bitterly over outsourcing and other issues during this fall’s eight-week lockout.

The CBC archives comprise thousands of hours of radio and TV footage, dating back decades. The Beeb is also the international sales agent for the CBS news archives.

CBC has recently turned out a number of short series by repurposing old footage, including the news spoof Jimmy McDonald’s Canada and the 3 x 30 Pop-Up Royals, with Scott Thompson.

www.cbc.ca