OTTAWA – It may not have all the drama of the Obama vs Romney debate, but new CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais’ faceoff Thursday afternoon before the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage promises to be far more informative. The committee is charged with examining the role and future mandate of the CRTC.
It will be a reversal of fortune for Chairman Blais who will be answering, not asking, the questions when he meets with MPs for the first time since he took over as head of the CRTC this past June. The meeting gets under way tomorrow afternoon from 3:30 pm to 5:30 pm and you can view it online here.
Blais, a veteran public servant, is the second CRTC chairman appointed by Stephen Harper and many assume he may be less confrontational towards the government compared to former chairman Konrad von Finckenstein – but there is little he or anyone has said publicly to back that assumption. However, he's already demonstrated he is not one to be intimidated by the country's largest media companies.
In recently presiding over the CRTC hearings into the Bell purchase of Astral Media he set the tone early by telling Bell that the "burden of proof" was on it to prove the transaction is in the public interest.
Blais has pledged to be more receptive of consumers' concerns and made a point on day one of the hearing to ask Bell what it has to say to the thousands of individual Canadians who were worried enough to officially complain to the CRTC about the purchase and even read from some of their letters. Tomorrow the burden of proof will be squarely on Blais to outline how the CRTC can successfully guide and shape Canada's digital future in these challenging times.
Cartt.ca will, of course, be watching.
