Péladeau willing to pull TVA Sports signal in fight with Bell

OTTAWA — Quebecor Inc. president and CEO Pierre Karl Péladeau said Monday that he would yank TVA Sports from BCE Inc.’s TV service over carriage fees — and denied that doing so would violate CRTC rules. Péladeau was in Ottawa to give a lunchtime speech at the Canadian Club of Ottawa, during which he spoke about what he said are unfairly low wholesale fees Quebecor’s TVA Sports channel earns in the French-language market. The CRTC already sided with Bell in its decision, which Quebecor appealed in court. The court rejected the appeal last year. Then, over the weekend, TVA and TVA Sports broadcast messages that Bell would “punish” subscribers by suspending the TVA Sports signal over the coming days. A Bell spokesperson said that it’s Quebecor who has threatened to remove the channel, “which would be contrary to broadcasting regulations.” The regulations in question would be the CRTC’s standstill rule, which states that during carriage disputes, the licensee has to continue to distribute the channel at the same rates and under the same terms and conditions as before the dispute. Péladeau told reporters after the speech Quebecor and Bell are still working on reaching an agreement, but that he is willing to take “necessary measures” if the two parties can’t come to a consensus. He also said that pulling the TVA Sports signal wouldn’t violate the standstill rule. In response to a Wire Report question, he said that’s Bell’s interpretation of the rule. “We don’t share the same kind of understanding.” He said in a separate comment, in French, that if Bell considers such a move to be illegal it can bring a complaint “in front of the authorities.” But it appears Bell did exactly that. On late Monday afternoon it issued a press release that said it had asked the CRTC for a directive telling Quebecor it couldn’t pull the channel’s signal, which the CRTC granted. Bell’s release also accused Quebecor of issuing “a series of misleading statements on its hockey broadcasts and other media platforms that falsely claimed Bell itself planned to remove access to TVA Sports, and that also directed Bell TV customers to switch to Quebecor’s cable TV subsidiary Videotron.” The release called that “an unprecedented move.” In a letter Monday, the CRTC said its "staff is of the view that the parties are engaged in such a dispute and therefore the standstill rule applies. Accordingly, Groupe TVA is required to provide the services and Bell is required to distribute these services, at the same rates and on the same terms and conditions as it did before the dispute, until the parties resolve their dispute or the Commission issues a decision concerning this unresolved matter." But Quebecor appeared to be standing firm Tuesday morning, with Quebecor’s senior vice-president of corporate and institutional affairs, Serge Sasseville, stating in a Twitter post written in French that tomorrow at 7 p.m., Bell would be depriving its subscribers of the Stanley Cup playoffs, following the withdrawal of the signal. That’s exactly when the playoffs will start, with the Columbus Blue Jackets v Tampa Bay Lightning game broadcasting on TVA Sports, while TVA Sports 2 will broadcast the Pittsburgh Penguins v New York Islanders match-up at 7:30 p.m. A Quebecor spokesperson did not immediately respond to questions about whether this means the signal will be pulled on Wednesday evening. Péladeau said Monday Quebecor has been “working for months and months … to try to convince of the value of our service. And the interesting thing is that we’ve been able to convince all the distributors in Quebec which are distributing TVA Sports of what we consider the appropriate ,” except for Bell, he said. Péladeau said that’s because Bell has its own French-language sports channel, RDS, which earns wholesale rates that are higher than TVA Sports. “They’re basically in a conflict of interest all day long. So doesn’t the CRTC understand that?” He said the CRTC should “let the customer decide” if they’re willing to pay more for a channel. Péladeau also told reporters he previously met with Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez, and that in the afternoon he would be meeting with Conservative leader Andrew Scheer and NDP leader Jagmeet Singh. He also used his speech to reiterate his stance that the federal government should follow the lead of Quebec and impose sales tax on Netflix Inc. and other over-the-top platforms. — With reporting by Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca and editing by Ahmad Hathout at ahathout@thewirereport.ca

Péladeau willing to pull TVA Sports signal in fight with Bell

News | April 8, 2019

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Péladeau willing to pull TVA Sports signal in fight with Bell

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