The CBC has officially filed a request with the CRTC to get "temporary relief from certain conditions of licence," so it can show the Toyko Olympics over a 19-day period, starting in late July. (That's provided the pandemic allows it to go on at all.)

The CBC is obligated to provide local programming and video description for all of its local channels and they obviously won't be able to fulfill that mandate when the Games are running. So they've asked permission to be relieved of those rules between July 21st and August 8th.

Have they ever had to do this before? Aren't they just allowed to show an event like this without asking permission? Or is this something that happens every four years? It just seems a little strange that they would have to go to these lengths to show special programming that would be of wide interest to many Canadians. There's a separate request in French for the same exemptions for Radio-Canada. 

Here's the text of their plea to the Commission:

1. This is an application by CBC/Radio-Canada for temporary relief from certain conditions of licence, which are calculated on a weekly basis. Specifically, CBC/Radio-Canada is seeking temporary relief on behalf of all of its conventional televisions stations (Appendix A) from weekly local programming and described video obligations in light of CBC/Radio-Canada’s upcoming broadcast of the Tokyo Olympic Games.

2. The Tokyo Olympic Games are scheduled over a 19-day period. These Olympic games will commence with pre-competitions on Wednesday, July 21 leading up to the the Opening Ceremonies on Thursday, July 22, 2021, and end with the Closing Ceremonies on Sunday, August 8, 2021. During this period, CBC/Radio-Canada will broadcast ongoing coverage of the Games, which will disrupt the scheduling of local programming and described video programming. We are therefore requesting temporary relief from the conditions of licence for described video and local programming for three broadcast weeks commencing July 18, July 25 and August 1, 2021.

Under their licence, the CBC has to produce at least five hours of local Canadian programming every week and local newscasts seven days a week, excluding holidays. (Although I don't recall CBLT having a local newscast on Sundays, and I wonder how they explain that.) They also have to have described video for a minimum of four hours a week. 

Does this happen for every station every time there's an Olympics? It seems crazy they would have to make this kind of application whenever they get the rights to the Games. Surely, the CRTC would never say no to the request. So why bother with all the red tape?