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WINNIPEG — The head of the CBC is hitting back at Conservative Leader Stephen Harper over comments the national broadcaster is floundering because of low ratings rather than a lack of funding.

CEO Hubert Lacroix says the CBC has healthy ratings, but is crippled by a broken funding model.

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“It’s not about a lack of audience,” he said after the CBC’s annual general meeting in Winnipeg on Tuesday. “It’s about a broken finance model that doesn’t work, that used to be built on advertising revenues supporting a drop in parliamentary appropriations. In this environment, it doesn’t work anymore.”

The 2012 federal budget cut CBC’s funding by $115 million over three years. Last year, the broadcaster said it faced a $130-million shortfall — compounded by the loss of broadcast rights to NHL games — and was cutting 657 jobs.

Harper told a private radio station in Quebec that the CBC’s budget crunch isn’t due to government cuts, but because of its low ratings.