Hon. Andrew Cardozo: Welcome minister. I would like to continue a discussion we have had before with you, given your work on the future of the CBC. The chamber here has had a couple of debates on the future of the CBC. One of our committees has been looking at the future of local programming on the CBC.

One of the major crises we face is the funding, of course, of media, both public and private. Would you support a process of funding for media that would be at arm’s length from the government, so continuing the kind of work that you have been doing and the funding you do provide through your department, but placing it at arm’s length so people have more confidence in its being free from political interference?

Hon. Steven Guilbeault, P.C., M.P., Minister of Canadian Identity and Culture and Minister responsible for Official Languages: I would, and, in fact, we do, senator. For example, the agreement with Google, the $100 million, is not distributed by the federal government. It is distributed by an arm’s-length, independent organization. So we have no say in who receives money, how much money they receive, and I think that is a very good thing that the federal government doesn’t do that. This is one example.

We want to look at whether there are other things we could do to support the Canadian media sector while ensuring that they continue to be independent, but that’s one very relevant example.