An important message from President Hubert: Standing up to criticism with a clear agenda

I have been reading a lot of nasty, out-of-context stuff recently about our senior executives in the papers owned by our competitors, notably a series of articles in The Sun and Le Journal de Montréal.

This Corporation prides itself on its accountability and responsible use of its limited resources, particularly since 60 per cent of our budget comes from Canadian taxpayers. This is why it is particularly irritating that the information laid out in these articles is often misleading, emphasizing dollar amounts with little or no context or comparison. The papers are less interested in reason and analysis than in a sensational headline. And, of course, they also conveniently overlook practices, financial or otherwise, in their own organizations.

Take Sylvain Lafrance for example. They lumped Sylvain's personal expenses in with corporate activities that he approved as the executive in charge of a business, and ascribed all expenses to him personally. If Sylvain approves the presence of CBC/Radio-Canada at a social event or approves the holding of a corporate event inside our organization to thank our employees for a job particularly well done, is it fair to say that these approved expenses are his own? C'mon. Let's be fair.

And a few weeks back, Le Journal de Montréal publicly attacked him for his expenses for a leadership program that he attended at Harvard in 2005, noting that he spent about $3,400, in expenses including hotels and meals and dry cleaning… We sent him to live in a hotel for eight weeks for god's sake. The same paper is likely to have another go at Sylvain for the cost of the program, which was about $52,000.

Consider what Sylvain does. He has been at CBC/Radio-Canada for 30 years and is entrusted with the task of managing 4,000 employees and about a half-billion dollar a year business. Sylvain's challenge has been to take two historically self-reliant organizations (radio and television), merge them and then integrate our Web services within those two units. The Corporation decided this Harvard course would help him do just that. This was about helping Sylvain become a better executive, and exposing him to others of like kind. There is absolutely no question in my mind that both the Corporation and Canadians got great value for their money. And it's worth adding that this isn't something we do regularly. Sylvain had a huge and important task to do, and we equipped him for it.

I want you to know that we will not ignore this issue or sit idly by and watch these attacks happen. We understand that we are entrusted with a billion dollars of public funds. And, in the current economic climate, we are doubly mindful of our financial responsibility to taxpayers. We get that. I don't need to ask that you continue to be reasonable and responsible in your own conduct. I know that you are.

I truly believe that both employees and taxpayers can rest assured that we are both effective and responsible stewards of the public funds we get from government. We will stand up and say so.

I can't speak for our competitors' principles in this context, but I will say this about ours:

We are subject to the Access to Information Act (ATIA), and we will abide by the law. We will safeguard CBC/Radio-Canada's strategic business interests, especially in an environment that is as competitive as ours. We will fervently defend our people – both their integrity and their privacy – at every turn.

Cheers.

Hubert
November 19, 2008