OTTAWA – Finally, all of the laws, regulations, policy and all sorts of other important documents when it comes to telecommunications in Canada are in one handy place.
Lawyer Hank Intven (following in the footsteps of his McCarthy Tetrault colleague Peter Grant) has just released the first edition of the Canadian Telecommunications Regulatory Handbook. As noted in the introduction of the volume, this 1200-page text was inspired by Grant’s Canadian Broadcasting Regulatory Handbook, which was first published in 1993 and is now nearing its 11th edition.
Finding all of the related statutes and policy, regulations and judicial decisions which cover the Canadian telecom industry takes some work as telecom is overseen by both Industry Canada and the CRTC, and this book, finally, puts everything in one place.
The handbook (pictured) is broken up into seven parts: an extensively footnoted synopsis by Intven; Statutes; Regulation, Directions and Rules; Industry Canada regulatory and Policy Documents; CRTC Regulatory and Policy Documents; Regulatory and Policy Documents (other Canadian agencies); and International Arrangements.
It’s quite literally everything you need to know about telecom law and regulation in Canada, plus a very handy glossary of telecom terms, and must have taken an incredible amount of work to gather, write and publish.
Even then though, Intven cautions that this book is really only a starting point. “In using this handbook, readers should keep several limitations in mind. First, telecommunications regulatory provisions and policies are set out in tens of thousands of documents issued over the past decades by Industry Canada and the CRTC,” he wrote. “While the documents collected in the handbook should provide an convenient starting point, it is important to check the websites of the regulatory agencies for updates and related documents.”
If only those sites made it as easy to find things as this book does.
– Greg O’Brien
Copies can be purchased on the McCarthy Tetrault web site.
