GRAVENHURST, Ont. – After Monday’s lunch where EastLink won the Canadian Cable Systems Alliance member of the year award and CTV the supplier of the year award, AGM delegates filled the Taboo Resort Boathouse to listen to what the CRTC had to say.
The much-anticipated panel featured Ontario regional commissioner Rita Cugini, vice-chair broadcasting Michel Arpin, executive director Len Katz, senior director distribution policy and applications and head of dispute resolution Randy Hutson and CCSA president and CEO Alyson Townsend.
With the demise of the Canadian Cable Television Association, Townsend talked about the CCSA’s new regulatory focus on behalf of its 90-member company membership and outlined some "wins" among some of her members. She pointed out to the regulators that without CCSA member systems there would be no telephony competition in some towns, no high speed Internet whatsoever in others and no local TV station – the community channel – in most of them.
"Competition increases efficiency and promotes creativity," said Townsend. "Without our companies, there would be no competition (in many of the communities)."
Townsend outlined some of the regulatory issues facing her membership such as high definition and the transition to digital, which is being resisted by some of the U.S. channels. With Canadian programmers and their satellite uplink partners squabbling over who will pay for the transmission of HD services, those two "have decided to charge the small systems," for distant delivery of those signals, said Townsend. "They’re saying ‘come and get it’, which is effectively a denial of access to the signal," she said.
Townsend also asked for an expedited process for her members’ video on demand license applications, for the Commission to be careful deregulating the telecom system and that the deferral accounts process (where there is about $650 million in the bank – drawn from the phone bills of Canadians – to build broadband to rural areas) restrict where Canada’s incumbent telcos can build out new networks to un-served areas where no independent cableco is already providing broadband access.
Arpin detailed the restructuring recently undertaken by the Commission geared towards making the CRTC more flexible and responsive.
He – and all the members on the panel, for that matter – asked those in attendance to approach the CRTC for help whenever they feel it’s needed – and when it comes to a dispute, "talk to (Hutson and his group) before it comes down to a clash between parties," Arpin said.
Cugini said informal discussions and visits are great ways for the Commission to understand the business of small cable (and, presumably, for small cablers to better understand the CRTC and its folks).
Katz sprung a Monday telecom decision on the membership too over the CLEC requirements of small cable operators, as Cartt.ca covered here.
As for the deferral accounts plans, the public process to consider those is under way and CCSA member companies will be given ample opportunity to respond, said Katz. There’s also the fact that certain consumer groups have appealed the decision to try and get the money sent back to Canadians to consider in terms of timing.
As for the VOD license process, legislation binds it to the longer process (six to nine months) before a license – which any applicant will most likely receive without any issue whatsoever, said Hutson.
Watch for more on the topics raised at this session on Cartt.ca in the days and weeks to come.
– Greg O’Brien
