BSO Hearing day 12: Market forces not working in rural Canada, say SILECs

By Perry Hoffman

Focus on transport, says ShawGATINEAU – The Joint Task Force (JTF) of small incumbent local exchange carriers (SILECs) in Canada offered a rather different option to the CRTC on Tuesday when it comes to ensuring there is broadband to every household in the country.Rather than a blanket subsidy available for all so-called high cost serving areas, it should only be available in under and unserved communities.In addition, the subsidy shouldn’t be available on a per exchange basis, but rather on a household or NAS level. If there are two ISPs (i.e. telco and cableco) providing service into a particular household,...