OTTAWA — A faith-based conservative family group said it would like the Harper government to intervene to block a broadcasting license issued to a new Canadian porn channel.

The Canada Family Action Coalition wants the Conservatives to quash last week’s decision by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to grant a license to an adult film network Northern Peaks.

The license granted to Alberta-based Real Productions requires the new channel broadcast 50 per cent Canadian content. That means Canadian young people will be enlisted to work on and in some cases appear in porn films, says Charles McVety, president of CFAC.

“It is to the public detriment to fuel an industry where women are degraded and treated as sex objects,” he said.
Mr. McVety says by setting such a high Canadian content requirement, the CRTC is effectively stimulating the growth of the domestic porn industry.

“If private companies want to engage in such activity, it’s not criminal in this nation, and they’re free to do so. But for the government to use to public resource to promote such degradation shows how detached the bureaucracy is from the Canadian people.”

He also says both CRTC and the cable companies give preferential treatment to lucrative porn broadcasters but short shrift religious programming. He is concerned that the CRTC will allow cable companies to offer the station on a free trial for a number of months.

“That to us is corrupting minds and getting them hooked on this material.”
Under the Broadcasting Act, CRTC decisions can be appealed to cabinet, although it is unusual for cabinet to overturn a decision, particularly one based on content. Such an appeal would put Mr. Harper’s government in the position of having to decide on the morality of legal pornography.

A spokesman for the Department of Canadian Heritage said cabinet would have 45 days to act on a request to review the CRTC decision on Northern Peaks.

Mr. McVety admits it is not particularly likely cabinet will get involved.
“We would be happy if they did, but we understand the parameters in which they operate and we don’t anticipate they will make such a move.”

The Harper government has drawn heavy criticism over attempts to curb funding for film and television productions it considers objectionable through controversial legislation, Bill C-10.

Critics says the bill amounts to censorship and would have stopped the production of even mainstream films such as the Canadian-made comedy, Young People F**king.