CRTC denies public interest group ask for expedited Rogers payment to Broadcasting Participation Fund

The CRTC in a decision last week denied an April 2023 application from a group of six public interest organizations asking the commission to accelerate the payment of tangible benefits allocated to the Broadcasting Participation Fund (BPF) as part of the CRTC’s March 2022 approval of Rogers’s acquisition of Shaw’s broadcasting assets. The group behind the application included the Public Interest Advocacy Centre, the Forum for Research and Policy in Communications, the Consumers’ Association of Canada (Manitoba), the Consumers Council of Canada, Option Consommateurs, and the Union des Consommateurs. In its March 2022 decision approving Rogers’s Shaw acquisition, the CRTC required Rogers to pay $725,439 to...