Bell Buying Astral: What Are We in For?

This week, CRTC hearings are taking place concerning BCE’s (owner of Bell Media) proposed $3.38 billion purchase of Montreal-based Astral Media, and as was the case in March when the deal was announced, media concentration in Canada is top of mind for consumers and industry professionals. Put more simply, this could be a little scary.

 

Bell Media Radio currently owns 35 radio stations. Astral owns 84. Those numbers alone represent a large chunk of the media pie in Canada.

Because the CRTC says a radio company cannot own more than two (English) FM and two AM radio stations in a given market, Bell will have to sell off 10 stations if the takeover is approved. Even so, that doesn’t put much of a dent in their acquisition.

But acquiring radio properties is not a big concern in this deal for Bell. CTV — which Bell owns — operates more than 25 TV stations across the country and 30 specialty channels including sports networks TSN and RDS. Astral is Canada's largest pay and specialty TV broadcaster, with 24 TV services, including specialty channels. If the sale is approved, Bell would also have to get rid of some television stations because the CRTC ownership policy for TV is the same as radio.

As a young broadcaster and journalist, the fact that Bell stands to gain as much of the Canadian media landscape as it does is concerning, especially when we think about Bell (or C TV) as a news outlet in Canada.

In theory, journalism is supposed to be as fair and balanced as possible—free of corporate and government influence.

Whether you’re a consumer of news, a journalist yourself, or both, you know that isn’t always the reality in the Canadian broadcasting industry. However, one of the objectives that minimizes concentration and corporate or government interference is what the CRTC calls “diversity of voices.”

Basically, their aim (sometimes more on paper than in practice) is to license radio and television broadcasters so there are as many players as possible in the industry. With a variety of players comes a variety of editorial voices and increased competition.

All good things, right? Things that give consumers multiple perspectives and allow broadcasters and writers to express differing points of view? And those are some of the many reasons communicators like myself are attracted to the media industry, right? I think so.

However, those aspirations may be pipe dreams for us young upstarts. According to the Montreal Gazette, The Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada told the CRTC Wednesday that media concentration in Canada has had troubling consequences.

“Apart from chilling diversity and neutering competition, concentrated media ownership has reduced employment opportunities in content creation,” said union vice-president Peter Murdoch.

“This is why CEP opposes this application.”

If the CRTC does approve the deal, it should ensure that Bell strengthens original, local broadcast news, Murdoch added.

Bell says that if it acquires Astral, it will own 33.5 per cent of the English language market and 24.4 per cent of the French-language market. That’s under the 35-per-cent threshold set by the CRTC for approval, but Bell’s competitors dispute that figure and say it’s actually higher.

Here’s hoping the CRTC does not take concerns over unfair monopolies and a possible lack of jobs in the industry lightly. They’ve certainly got their work cut out for them.