Federal Heritage Minister Melanie Joly reiterated Friday it is up to Finance Minister Bill Morneau to decide whether Netflix should be subject to the GST.

"I'm in charge of culture," Joly said in Montreal. "Mr. Morneau is finance minister and in charge of taxation."

The issue has been at the core of objections to a revamped cultural policy Joly unveiled in September.

It included securing a $500-million pledge by Netflix, the online video streaming giant based in California, to set up a Canadian branch of operations and fund original homegrown content.

Netflix also committed to spend $25 million on strategy to develop the market for French-language content, but the lack of a contractual obligation to actually go ahead and produce it came under heavy scrutiny in Quebec, where Joly and her plan were pilloried and dismissed as naive.

Quebec Finance Minister Carlos Leitao sent a letter to Morneau on Nov. 7 calling on Ottawa to join the province in taxing foreign online businesses, including Netflix, but warning that the province is also prepared to go it alone.

A spokeswoman for Morneau said at the time the Liberal government had no plans to change its mind.

Joly said Friday she understands that people have concerns.

"I am in charge of culture within the government," she said. "I hear what is happening in Quebec, I hear the reaction, and it will give me great pleasure to transmit that to my colleagues.

"What I hear in terms of the anxiety toward the fact there is not enough support for French production, that is my job to talk to the company to say that my expectation is that they invest in francophone content."