Seven media experts have been selected to advise on the renewal of CBC/Radio-Canada. The group will advise the Minister of Heritage, Pascale St-Onge, primarily on the governance and funding of the Canadian public broadcaster.

In a statement on Monday, St-Onge said the committee members have diverse perspectives and experiences that will help modernize CBC and its French-language arm, Radio-Canada. She also said the panel will contribute to promoting Canadian culture, stories, languages, artists and creators.

“Canadians need a strong, innovative and independent public broadcaster that is ready to meet the challenges of this period of transformation and upheaval in news and content creation,” St-Onge added.

The panel includes Marie-Philippe Bouchard, CEO at TV5 Quebec Canada; Jesse Wente, chair of the Canada Council for the Arts, and founding executive director of the Indigenous Screen Office; Jennifer McGuire, managing director at Pink Triangle Press; David Skok, CEO and editor-in-chief at The Logic; Mike Ananny, associate professor of communication and journalism at University of Southern California, Annenberg; Loc Dao, executive director at DigiBC; Catalina Briceno, professor at Universite du Quebec a Montreal.

St-Onge had already announced that the role of the public broadcaster would be redefined before the next federal election, scheduled for October 2025. For her part, CBC president Catherine Tait has been calling for a long-term financial structure for the company. According to her, CBC/Radio-Canada is projecting a $20 million deficit for the 2024-25 fiscal year, despite recently cutting 141 staff members and deleting 205 vacant posts since December.

“I’ve been in this business 40 years and never before have I seen so great pressure on our domestic industry, and it is very worrisome,” Tait told the committee. “We see people disappearing, companies disappearing, production houses shutting down.”

The public broadcaster operates with an annual parliamentary appropriation of approximately $1.2 billion and additional revenues generated from advertising, subscriptions and other commercial activities. In the 2022-23 fiscal year, the company’s annual report showed it received nearly $1.3 billion in government funding, with another $515 million coming from other revenues such as advertising.