By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – After a victory in Federal Court in February 2022, Québecor is requesting the CRTC remove an exemption from a small broadcasting distribution undertaking (BDU) and strike its name from the list of exempted undertakings for having acted in contravention of the Broadcasting Act.
After noticing various hotels in the region of Québec City were cancelling their subscriptions, Québecor sent technicians to rent rooms in some of these hotels in 2020. They were able to determine the hotels were receiving TVA and TVA Sports through a third party.
The provider, Coopérative de câblodistribution Hill Valley, was not registered with the CRTC as an exempted BDU until early 2021 and it is that registration Quebecor is trying to void.
Hill Valley was also using set top boxes provided by Konek, whose business place was in the same offices in Québec City.
Because Québecor viewed their distribution of TVA and TVA Sports as a violation of the Copyright Act (since they did not seek permission nor did they pay rights), the company went to the Federal Court, which ruled that prior to obtaining a CRTC BDU exemption, Hill Valley was in violation of section 31 of the Copyright Act for distributing TVA’s over-the-air signal; in the case of the TVA Sports signal, they were also found to be in violation of the act.
Another company, also located in the same premises as Konek and Hill Valley, Libéo, had purchased a Vidéotron subscription that provided the signal to the various hotels. But the Federal Court did not deem Libéo liable of a copyright infringement. Québecor is appealing that portion of the ruling in the Federal Court of Appeal.
The procedure followed in Federals Court is a summary trial, which allows the court and the parties to determine whether there is a case without going into all the lengthy procedures. Now, the full procedure is going forward with a trial date set at the beginning of 2023. It will determine the amount to be paid in damages.
It should be noted that the Federal Court judge did not acquiesce with Québecor that an injunction could be issued as part of that summary trial, so Hill Valley can continue providing services, but it could increase the damages.
“The Federal Court found that Konek had violated the Copyright Act. The Court has yet to rule on damages. Content theft remains a critical threat to Canada’s creative sector, impacting rights holders and creators across the industry and causing hundreds of millions of dollars in damages and thousands of lost jobs. There’s a real cost to piracy,” Véronique Mercier, vice-president of communications at Quebecor, indicated to Cartt.ca in an email.
Parties can provide interventions on this matter to the CRTC until June 6. Surely, other BDUs will follow this whole affair.
