A law requiring U.S. streaming giants to inject millions into Canada’s creative sector risks becoming a target in Washington amid President Donald Trump’s threat to impose tariffs on all foreign-produced films, experts say.
A body representing several U.S. platforms called this week for a halt to the implementation of Ottawa’s Online Streaming Act, which has yet to be fully enacted by Canada’s broadcasting regulator.
Adam Taylor, a trade expert representing U.S. movie studios and streaming platforms, said foreign interactions with the U.S. screen industry are now “fully in the crosshairs of the Trump administration,” and the act – which was known as Bill C-11 – is likely to become another sticking point in trade negotiations.
Mr. Taylor said that “with the Trump administration targeting Canada’s film industry,” it is only a matter of time before the Online Streaming Act moves up the agenda in Washington.
He said he thinks Canada should put revisiting the act on the table with the White House to stop the issue from escalating.
“We know that the U.S. Trade Representative has already flagged the Online Streaming Act as a bilateral trade issue of concern that discriminates against U.S. companies, and so we should fully expect that this issue is now in the basket of other bilateral trade issues that are going to need to be negotiated,” he said.
The act modernized Canada’s broadcasting law, requiring foreign streaming platforms to support Canadian creative industries – including film and TV – as traditional broadcasters do. They are also required to promote Canadian content.
The law will compel foreign streaming giants to collectively pay about $200-million a year to support Canadian music, TV, film and radio.
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission has yet to fully implement the Online Streaming Act, which received royal assent two years ago. It is currently looking at modernizing the official definition of Canadian content.
Graham Davies, president and chief executive of the Digital Media Association – which represents companies with streaming platforms, including Amazon, Apple and YouTube – said the act “is discriminatory” and “unfairly punishes streaming services.”
“We are urging the new federal government to reconsider the continued implementation of this flawed legislation,” he said.
Michael Geist, Canada Research Chair in internet law at the University of Ottawa, said the regime set up by Bill C-11, mandating payments by American streaming platforms to pay for Canadian productions, could be seen as protectionist and “pose significant risks in the Trump era.”
“There’s a significant risk that especially Bill C-11 could become the target for Trump’s clear concerns about the state of the U.S. film sector,” he said.
Last year, 19 members of Congress, including 11 Republicans, wrote to then-U.S. trade representative Katherine Tai, saying the act discriminates against Americans and asking her to take up the matter with Canada.
It was raised as an issue of concern by Ms. Tai before Mr. Trump took office in January. Bill C-11 was also raised during talks in 2022 at the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement Free Trade Commission ministerial meeting.
Last year, several foreign streaming platforms – including Netflix, Amazon and Spotify – launched Federal Court challenges to how the regulator is implementing the Online Streaming Act.
Mr. Trump’s tariff threat prompted calls from within Canada’s film sector for greater domestic support for the industry.
Reynolds Mastin, president and CEO of the Canadian Media Producers Association, said in an e-mail that Mr. Trump’s announcement “is further proof that Canada must have rules in place that support a strong, independent domestic industry.”
“We can partner with foreign companies – in fact we want to – but we need to be able to tell our stories without depending on them.”
Jack Blum, executive director of Reel Canada, said Mr. Trump’s pronouncement is “potentially disastrous” not just for the Canadian film industry but the Hollywood studios, and “entirely incomprehensible.”
“I can’t imagine the voices against this being any louder than in LA,” he added.
He said the film industry is “integrated across the world” and big film productions involve expertise in many countries, which “works extremely well.”
As well as shooting on location in Canada, U.S. film studios rely on Canadian expertise including in sound editing, animation and special effects, he said.
Canada must develop not just its own film industry but work more closely with filmmakers outside the U.S., including in Europe and India, Mr. Blum added. He mentioned the 2015 film Brooklyn, a co-production with Britain and Ireland starring Saoirse Ronan and Jim Broadbent, as an example of such a successful collaboration.
“We have to wean ourselves away from the U.S. and strengthen domestic production, and reinstate our relationships with other countries around the world,” he said.