ANALYSIS: Is the Bell-MTS deal in trouble? Will Shaw be brought into the mix?

Minister Bains wouldn’t say, except perhaps between the linesOTTAWA – It’s been nearly seven months since Bell Canada announced an agreement to buy Manitoba Telecom Services for $3.9 billion and still there has been no official word from the federal government on what it thinks of the deal.The Competition Bureau is the primary regulator Bell has to satisfy with this purchase, but since the Bureau doesn’t do public hearings the way the CRTC does, we really don’t know what it is telling BCE officials about the deal, or the questions it has, but the six-plus months of silence from both...