Media Beat: Counting The Costs of Canadian Media Executives (Column)

Counting the costs at the CBC, Bell Media and Rogers

In an interview broadcast Saturday on CBC Radio's The House, CBC president and CEO Catherine Tait said she her primary objective is to transform CBC/Radio-Canada into a more efficient and valuable service. Asked about PC leader Pierre Poilievre’s crusade to kill financial support for the Crown Corp., Tait defended her role in preserving the pubcaster and calmly stated an end is not her focus.

"Of course, we worry about the possibility, but I don't think that … spending a whole lot of time trying to guess what that will look like is going to be effective over the next months. Our job is to convince Canadians of our value," she told host Catherine Cullen.

CBC/Radio-Canada operates 27 television stations, 88 radio stations and one digital-only station. Additionally, it has five subscription television channels and four Canada-wide radio networks, two in English, and two in French. At last count, it employed 6,600 permanent employees and 2,800 temporary and contractual workers.

Tait's annual compensation is between $472,900 and $623,900, according to the CBC's 2023 senior management compensation summary. This includes salary, bonus and other benefits.

The complete interview with Catherine Tait can be found here.

What Rogers’ CEO earns

By contrast, Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri earned $ 31.52 million in total pay during his first year as the chief executive officer of Rogers Communications Inc. At last count, the company has approximately 22,000 employees working in its cable, internet, home security and media properties. Additionally, the company has a charter to operate Rogers Bank.

And at Bell Inc.

BCE Inc. president and CEO Mirko Bibic received compensation of $13.4 million in 2023, according to regulatory documents sent to shareholders. Its Bell Media division is the largest radio broadcaster in Canada, with 215 music channels including 103 licensed radio stations in 58 markets across the country. It also owns and operates 30 local television stations led by CTV Television Network; 29 specialty channels, including TSN and RDS; and four pay TV services, including Crave. The media division has approximately 5,000 full-time employees.

Forget Trump's biopic, Randy Rainbow spills the dirt

Days following the debut of a biopic about Donald Trump at the Cannes Film Festival, the popular American singing parodist Randy Rainbow has released his a satirical music video about Trump that rearranges Dolly Parton’s hit song “9 to 5” to skewer the presumptive president and if it wasn’t so playful one could call it cruel. For or against the Republican nominee, Rainbow’s musicality and brazen humour have to make you chuckle or laugh out loud.