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Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker
A lot of it is a reflection of the market as opposed to any conscious plan by CBC. I bet viewership numbers would show New Brunwickers will watch these regional shows while Newfoundlanders will not, and advertising dollars would probably follow this pattern as well.
CBC Here & Now, their hour-long evening news program in St. John's, tanked in the ratings when CBC tried to make it 30 minutes local, and 30 minutes with the national anchors. It was a cold business decision to restore our hour-long newscast to protect their market share (and they still haven't fully recovered, people dropped it so quickly and completely for Newfoundland Television's evening news hour, which is objectively inferior in every possible way).
You see that defense of place in everything. We are one of the only places on earth where Pepsi is more popular than Coke, solely because Coke closed their bottling plant here while Pepsi's is still in operation. There are numerous gas stations, restaurants, etc. that refuse to serve Coke. I think you don't find that unity and stubbornness in New Brunswick so they can just lump you in with Halifax and you take it.
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Keep in mind also that the "base" market for the CBC's English services in New Brunswick is about the same size as in Newfoundland: around half a million people.
New Brunswick has about 750,000 people but about one third of them are francophones.
Obviously there may be some francophone New Brunswickers who are consumers of CBC English programming, but not that many in the grand scheme of things.