Membership in l’Association des realisateurs et realisatrices du Quebec, representing French-language film and tv directors, has increased to 320 from 250 last year. Indie tv producers in the apftq are now ‘automatically’ deducting union dues (3%) from directors’ salaries at source, one of the factors adding to the arrq’s growth, says Lise Lachapelle, the association’s recently named director-general. ‘Others have joined because they’re sympathetic with our association.’

arrq signed a limited collective agreement with the apftq last year covering variety and certain magazine programs, but negotiations covering remuneration and working conditions in tv have become the subject of legal arbitration under the supervision of a judge named by the Commission de Reconaissance des associations d’artistes et de producteurs, a Quebec government administrative tribunal.

Both sides have arrived at the table with their own negotiating committees, ‘assessors’ (advisors) and lawyers. And while there is no fixed deadline to resolve the many outstanding issues, Lachapelle says both sides are conscious of the high cost of arbitration, and both will have to compromise. An ‘assessor’ is a sort of ‘privileged advisor’ to the arbitration judge. Francois Cote is representing the directors. Paul Cadieux represents the producers.

arrq in association with Union des Artistes, screenwriters in La Societe des auteurs de radio, television et cinema, and technicians in stcvq and apvq have filed a joint policy statement on the Canadian Television Fund review with the Department of Canadian Heritage. *

-www.arrq.qc.ca