By Ahmad Hathout
OTTAWA – British Columbia’s minister of transportation and infrastructure (MOTI) has filed an application to the CRTC asking it to suspend a November decision that forces it to enter agreements with third party carriers wanting to attach equipment on poles that are being moved by the province.
The November decision was triggered by a Rogers and Shaw application, which asked that they be treated similarly to the incumbent Telus when it comes to compensation to relocate their transmission lines when the province decides to move their poles. In the decision, the CRTC said the province must either stop compensating Telus or compensate Rogers and Shaw at a rate not less favourable than what Telus gets.
But it also said in two sections of the decision that the province must enter agreements with other carriers not named Rogers and Shaw on request and include similar terms.
In a Part 1 application posted Tuesday, British Columbia said the CRTC has no jurisdiction to order it to enter agreements with parties that did not request a review with the commission.
“The first error is that the Directives to MOTI relate to any carriers other than the Two Applicants that request an agreement, even though any such carrier would not have been an applicant to the application” that resulted in the November decision,” the application said.
The minister points to section 43(4) of the Telecommunications Act, which outlines matters related to issues with a public authority. “The subsection does not provide the Commission to make directions to a public authority in respect of carriers that made no such application…[and] not to issue orders of general application to a public authority governing the terms on which that public authority must consent to the construction of transmission lines to unknown carriers attaching to poles owned by [Telus] who have not applied to the Commission.”
The minister is also challenging the CRTC order that it could cease to continue compensating Telus because it hits on a private law of contract.
The provincial government said it would be irreparably harmed if the decision is allowed to stand, as committing to agreements with third parties would cost it money it would not be able to get back if it wins its challenge.
“If immediate relief is not granted, MOTI expects that the administrative costs of implementing the Directives will exceed any relocation costs payable to any such carriers with attachments on TCI poles under any resulting short-term agreements that might be finalized and in effect until the CRTC approves a tariff for TCI as contemplated by the directives,” it said in the application.
