Will a new ISED minister mean a 3500 MHz auction delay?
OTTAWA – Innovation, Science and Economic Development and Heritage Canada could new ministers when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau unveils his new cabinet on November 20.
The rumour mill has Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna replacing Navdeep Bains, whose deft handling of complicated telecom and technology files earned him respect from within those industries.
“I think she can do it. She managed to skate through environment without getting her head lopped off, so she must know what she’s doing,” said John Lawford, executive director and general counsel of the Ottawa-based Public Interest Advocacy Centre, who added Bains’ departure would also be “unfortunate” because the incumbent minister would ensure continuity to a department facing complex regulatory issues and which would require significant ramp-up time for his successor.
Lawford credited Bains for making tough decisions, as ISED minister, including rejecting Bell Canada’s request that cabinet overturn the CRTC’s 2015 decision that ordered the country’s major telcos to share their high-speed infrastructure with smaller carriers at a wholesale cost.
“He understood what was important to consumers when there were reports of sales over-reach by companies and called for a hearing on sales practices because the average person think it’s a problem, and he had to contradict the CRTC, which didn’t want an inquiry,” said Lawford.
“The CRTC produced a report that said there was a problem, so it was a great call by Bains.”
If Bains moves and McKenna doesn’t get ISED, Daniel Bernhard, executive director of Canadian Friends of Broadcasting, believes that Justice Minister David Lametti is up to the task, as does Lawford University of Ottawa professor Michael Geist, on stage at last week’s ISP Summit, also speculated Lametti might get the gig. The man who replaced Jody Wilson-Raybould as attorney general taught intellectual property law at McGill Universitya, where he was a full professor, and was co-founder of the McGill Centre for Intellectual Property Policy.
“When it comes to intangibles, how data works, and the knowledge economy, he’s probably the most expert in the cabinet on those issues,” said Bernhard.
Trudeau could also choose Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, MP for the Toronto riding of Beaches-East York, who would be “another excellent candidate” for ISED, Bernhard said.
In the last Parliament, Erskine-Smith, who is also a lawyer, served as vice-chair of the House Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, as well as the International Grand Committee on Big Data, Privacy and Democracy, which earlier this year summoned Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg to appear before the group and that Zuckerberg and Sandberg chose to ignore.
One other possible promotion from within the Liberal caucus is Greg Fergus, who represents the Quebec riding of Hull-Aylmer in the House and who served as Bains’s parliamentary secretary from 2015 to 2017.
A new ISED minister would mean that cabinet member will have to hit the ground running, said Lawford.
He explained that the file would feature pressing issues “in the heart of telecom,” including the CRTC’s public hearing on its review of mobile wireless services that begins in February and the plan by incumbent carriers to petition cabinet regarding the CRTC’s August decision on wholesale rates for high-speed internet access services over which they were granted a temporary stay from the Federal Court of Appeal.
There is also speculation the arrival of a new minister and the learning curve required could mean that the 3500 MHz spectrum auction to support 5G wireless scheduled for 2020 won’t happen until 2021.
If Bains is shuffled out of ISED, it’s unclear where he could land in the new cabinet, but Lawford expects the one-term minister would be handed a senior and/or sensitive portfolio, such as natural resources, particularly since Bains served as the Official Opposition critic on that file for the Liberals under Stéphane Dion’s leadership.
There is also speculation Bains could become Minister of Public Safety (former Minister Ralph Goodale lost his seat in the election), where one of his first decisions would overlap with ISED – what to do about Huawei.
Canadian Heritage may also get a new minister as Pablo Rodriguez, who was previously the chief government whip, is being touted as the next government House leader, according to this report.
Should that happen, Bardish Chagger, who has the House leader job now and was previously minister of small business and tourism within ISED, could get Heritage, offered Lawford.
Some may not miss Rodriguez, the trilingual Quebec MP.
“Ministers that tweet stuff contrary to a panel they’ve appointed prejudging their results is not helpful,” said Lawford, referring to Rodriguez’s comments on the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Review Panel’s interim report in June, where he insisted foreign digital companies would have to contribute to Canadian content.
“I wish he hadn’t shown what looked like a preference for a particular solution without receiving the final report,” he added.
But Friends’ Bernhard credits Rodriguez with “salvaging” the “all-important heritage file in Quebec that was put in a dumpster fire” by his predecessor, Mélanie Joly. “But, I never saw him as a Heritage minister first and more as a politics guy,” said Bernhard, who would like to see Montreal-born Toronto-Danforth MP Julie Dabrusin succeed Rodriguez.
“She speaks French; has all the film studios in her riding which was once represented by Jack Layton; and was the chair of the Commons heritage committee.”
However, Lawford believes the next heritage minister will have to be a Quebec MP who has “an appreciation for the cultural industries” in the province where culture matters most.
His picks range from a senior cabinet minister – such as François-Philippe Champagne, who held the consequential international trade portfolio before being moved to infrastructure and communities last year – to Will Amos, MP for the western Quebec riding of Pontiac, who could also fill the ISED ministerial role, according to Lawford.
“He also comes from my activist end of town; his office was a few floors below mine when he worked for Ecojustice Canada as a lawyer.”
