Heated Rivalry star Hudson Williams presents Prime Minister Mark Carney with a fleece from the show on the red carpet at a gala in Ottawa on Jan. 29.PATRICK DOYLE/The Canadian Press
The head of the production company behind the hit hockey-romance series Heated Rivalry says he is holding off sending Prime Minister Mark Carney his own Team Canada-style fleece jacket, worn by one of the show’s lead characters, until the future of Ottawa’s online streaming law is clear and enacted “for real.”
The law, which would make foreign streaming services including Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime financially support Canada’s film, TV and music industries alongside Canada’s broadcasters, has been branded a trade irritant by Washington and a potential issue in United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement renegotiations.
Earlier this month, Canadian Identity and Culture Minister Marc Miller asked the regulator implementing the Online Streaming Act to review its decision to make the streamers pay 15 per cent of their Canadian revenues to support Canada’s cultural industries.
To help fill the funding gap, Mr. Miller said the government would inject $600-million a year into the sector.
The minister is also preparing a policy direction to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) asking it recalibrate how funds from foreign streamers would be allocated, after a number of court cases by streaming companies. The policy changes would mean the foreign streamers would not have to support local Canadian news or niche broadcasters such as the Indigenous broadcaster APTN.
Miller rejects claims Ottawa ‘has sold out Canadian culture’ over Online Streaming Act
Brendan Brady, CEO and executive producer at Accent Aigu Entertainment, which produces Heated Rivalry, said the annual $600-million, though welcome, is “a Band-Aid” that would only be guaranteed while the current government remains in power.
“While I appreciate the…