CBC Television - Overview

Overview

CBC Television provides a complete 24-hour network schedule of news, sports, entertainment and children's programming, in most cases feeding the same programming at the same local times nationwide, except to the Newfoundland Standard Time Zone, where programs air 30 minutes "late".

As of 6:00 a.m. on October 9, 2006, the network went to a 24-hour schedule, becoming one of the last major English-language broadcasters to do so. Previously, most CBC-owned stations actually signed off the airwaves during the early morning hours (typically 1:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m.). Instead of the infomercials aired by most private stations, or a simulcast of CBC Newsworld in the style of BBC One's nightly simulcast of BBC News channel, the CBC uses the time to air repeats, including local news, primetime series, movies, and other programming from the CBC library. However, its French counterpart, Télévision de Radio-Canada, still signs off every night.

While historically there has been room for regional differences in the schedule, as there is today (see "Stations", below), for CBC-owned stations, funding has decreased to the point that most of these stations only broadcast 30 to 60 minutes a day of local news, and usually no other local programming.

Until the mid-1990s, the network carried a variety of American programs in addition to its core Canadian programming, directly competing with private Canadian broadcasters such as CTV and Global. Since then, it has restricted itself to Canadian programs, a handful of British programs, and a few American movies and off-network repeats. Since this change, the CBC has sometimes struggled to maintain ratings comparable to those it achieved before 1995, although it has seen somewhat of a ratings resurgence in recent years. In the 2007-08 season, hit series such as Little Mosque on the Prairie and The Border helped the network achieve its strongest ratings performance in over half a decade.

In 2002, CBC Television and CBC News Network became the first broadcasters in Canada (and very likely the first broadcasters worldwide) required to provide closed captioning for 100% of their programming. On those networks, only outside commercials need not be captioned, though a bare majority of them are aired with captions. All shows, bumpers, billboards, promos, and other internal programming must be captioned. The requirement stems from a human rights complaint filed by deaf lawyer Henry Vlug, which was settled in 2002.