Saturday, August 21, 2010

Ian Morrison: How to fix the CBC


The Friends of Public Broadcasting head offers yet another tome on how to "fix" the CBC:

" . . .I would like to offer a suggestion to improve CBC's corporate culture. In recent years, CBC's top management has lacked prior experience in radio or television production, scheduling and marketing. Having people in charge who lack appropriate skills would be unthinkable in private-sector broadcasting, or in public broadcasters in other western democracies. How come? CBC's board of directors does not choose CBC's president. And the board cannot dismiss the president. Guess who chooses the president of the CBC? The prime minister. This is not a new development. It goes back to 1936. Stephen Harper appointed Hubert Lacroix as CBC president just as Jean Chrétien appointed his predecessor, Robert Rabinovitch.

In contrast, the director general of the BBC is chosen by the BBC's trustees, and those trustees can fire their director general. The BBC's process is the rule among public broadcasters in industrial democracies. Canada's process is an anomaly. . . "

Planetguys wonder whether that would "fix" anything but maybe we are missing something.

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