Hon. Céline Hervieux-Payette:

Honourable senators, my question is for the Leader of the Government and follows on the excellent questions by Senator Fox.

As the minister may know, Canada's cultural industry and that of Quebec in particular, is much smaller than that of the United States or Europe.

Canadians want a vibrant cultural industry that, unfortunately, can only survive with help from the federal government. I need not remind the leader that Canadian artists create excellent musical and cinematographic works. A Quebec film — Incendies — has been nominated for an Oscar. Other Canadian works have won a number of international awards.

Canadian culture has not seemed to be a priority of your government in recent years. Prime Minister Harper has said he prefers to watch American channels for news. In light of such comments, are we to deduce that the Conservative government — which does not like the CBC much either — will reconsider the cultural exception in the North American Free Trade Agreement and not negotiate such an exception in the free trade agreement with the European Union?

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