OTTAWA – The CRTC said Tuesday that it will be requesting confidential information from the parties in its review of the internet framework to support the Competition Bureau’s study on the state of the wireline internet market.
The commission had previously ordered already-collected confidential information be forwarded to the Competition Bureau in early June.
On Tuesday, the regulator said in a letter that the bureau requested that it “issue additional specific RFIs and order the disclosure to him of any confidential information filed in the responses to those RFIs…[and] he be given 100 days from receipt of that information to complete his study.”
“Given the breadth of issues being considered in this proceeding, the Commission considers that additional RFIs are appropriate to further develop the public record,” the commission said in the letter.
“Some of these RFIs will be issued shortly by way of separate letter,” it added. “The RFIs will be informed by the Commission’s needs while taking into account the burden that these requests impose on parties and the need for the timely progress of this proceeding. Therefore, the RFIs will not simply replicate what the Commissioner had requested.”
At the same time, the CRTC is opening a new round of comments in the wholesale internet framework proceeding, which seeks to establish a more competitive ecosystem and lower internet prices. The new deadline for interventions is October 16.
