CBC president accuses MPs of trying to ‘vilify’ and ‘discredit’ her, defends executive bonuses

Catherine Tait also warns that eliminating English services would result in 3,500 layoffs and reduce access to amateur sports and music

Published Oct 21, 2024  •  2 minute read

CBC President and Chief Executive Officer Catherine Tait arrives to appear as a witness at a House of Commons Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage (CHPC) in Ottawa on Oct. 21, 2024. Photo by Sean Kilpatrick /THE CANADIAN PRESS

OTTAWA — The CEO and president of CBC/Radio-Canada says she believes members of the parliamentary heritage committee have been using her appearances to “vilify and to discredit” her, along with the public broadcaster as a whole, as she defended bonuses paid to executives. 

Catherine Tait was called to testify about $18 million in bonuses the corporation approved paying out to executives and other managers during for the last fiscal year, while it cut 141 jobs and eliminated another 205 vacancies, citing a financial shortfall.

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Monday marked Tait’s third appearance to discuss bonuses and job cuts.

During her testimony, the outgoing CEO repeatedly defended the pay as being “performance” or “incentive” compensation, which is outlined in the contracts of non-unionized employees, including its executives, which received around $3 million during the last fiscal year.

Tait’s term is due to expire in January 2025, with the government planning to announce her replacement this fall.

Not only are non-unionized employees entitled to receive performance pay according to their contracts, Tait said cutting them would not have saved any jobs. Furthermore, Tait testified it is critical for the corporation’s independence to be respected in terms of how it manages it finances and operations.

The committee heard Tait herself has not received such compensation for the past two fiscal years.

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More important than questions over CBC/Radio-Canada’s use of performance pay was the “narrative” that the public broadcaster ought to be defunded, Tait argued.

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“I would say that there is a clear effort on the part of members of this committee to vilify and to discredit me and to discredit the organization.”

She said not only has the push to axe the broadcaster’s roughly $1.4 billion it receives in annual public funding brought damage to its reputation, it has created a “highly demoralizing” environment for its journalists, who are facing constant criticism.

Although Tait didn’t name names, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre had vowed to “defund” the broadcaster, should his party form government. His office has said it would plan to maintain Francophone news services, but has yet to outline a plan how, given how its English and French programming wings belong to the same corporation.

Earlier this year, Tait warned in a private email, obtained by the National Post, that she worried about how “the ‘defund’ narrative has picked up momentum — especially as it relates to CBC television.”

She told Monday’s committee that eliminating its English services would result in 3,500 job layoffs. Cutting its funding would also reduce Canadians’ access to coverage of amateur sports and music, as well as impact the preservation of Indigenous languages.

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“We would be impoverishing this country.”

National Post

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