Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge says CBC President and CEO Catherine Tait should explain and provide reasons for the public broadcaster's choice regarding executive bonuses.Earlier this month, Tait mentioned it was too soon to determine if executive bonuses would be given out this year. This happened the same day when the CBC revealed 800 job cuts to deal with a $125-million budget shortfall.St-Onge pointed out the CBC has independence and control over its pay decisions. However, she mentioned bonuses have been frozen in the past.“Catherine, Madame Tait, needs to be transparent about this. It was brought up. She said that the decision wasn’t made. So we’ll see what happens with that,” St-Onge told the Globe and Mail. “They need to answer those questions and justify if they’re not going to do it.”Tait and seven CBC vice-presidents issued a statement indicating they were examining senior executives' compensation. This came in response to MPs from various political parties expressing concern when Tait revealed that bonuses would be determined after announcing job cuts.In 2024, St-Onge will start searching for a new leader to replace Tait, who has been in charge of CBC since 2018.Pablo Rodriguez, former heritage minister, extended Tait's contract earlier this year, giving her an additional 18 months, which means her term now goes until January 2025.A Canadian citizen, Tait was selected for her position after having worked in the independent film and television industry for more than 30 years.St-Onge stated one of her main focuses is to assess the purpose of CBC-Radio-Canada to ensure it can continue to exist. She intends to set up an expert committee to examine what CBC-Radio-Canada should be like in the future.In the 2021-22 fiscal year, CBC-Radio-Canada received $1.2 billion in government funding. Additionally, it generates revenue through advertising.“It’s not the role of the government to manage the everyday life at CBC-Radio-Canada, so I’m not going to interfere with their independence,” said St-Onge. “I think if we want to discuss the viability and is CBC-Radio-Canada on the right track or not, what needs to change, we need to do it in a broader perspective. It’s not about the management. We’re doing it because there’s a media crisis. And I’m not focusing only on one individual, I’m looking at the entire portrait.”Last week, St-Onge limited CBC-Radio-Canada's portion of the $100 million that Google will annually contribute to the Canadian news industry because of the Online News Act to $7 million.The minister stated Canada's media industry is experiencing a crisis, but CBC-Radio-Canada has a certain level of stability and predictability due to public funding.“They know that they can rely on this, anyways as long as we’re in power,” said St-Onge.The Conservative party promised to stop funding the CBC if they win the next federal election.
