By Denis Carmel
GATINEAU – In a letter sent on Monday, December 7, CRTC staff has indicated that in its dispute against Cablevision, a Bell subsidiary, Quebecor has convinced them that the issue warrants an expedite process.
This process, the fourth in 16 months, features Quebecor’s Vidéotron, which is trying to launch high-speed Internet service in the Abitibi-Temiscamingue region on northwestern Quebec region as third party internet service provider riding on Cablevision du Nord’s network.
Previous requests related to Bell’s attempting to end its tariffs, then its reluctance to sign service agreements, in July 2019. Then Québecor argued Bell claimed…
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GATINEAU — The CRTC announced today it has approved the application submitted by the Canadian Administrator of VRS (CAV) for $27,251,477 in funding from the National Contribution Fund (NCF) for 2021.
The Commission has directed the central fund administrator of the NCF to remit the approved amount to the CAV in 12 equal monthly installments, beginning in January 2021.
Access to this funding will enable the CAV to continue to offer video relay service (VRS) in Canada to the benefit of all Canadians, as envisioned by the Commission in Telecom Regulatory Policy 2014-187, the CRTC said today in its decision.
VRS…
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TORONTO — Corus Entertainment today confirmed to Cartt.ca that it is not renewing its licensing deal with BBC to operate the BBC Canada channel, which will no longer be available as of January 1, 2021.
This is the only BBC channel to which Corus owns the licensing rights for Canada, and therefore no other BBC-branded channels are affected by this news.
According to the last financial information Corus filed with the CRTC, as of August 31, 2019, the BBC Canada channel had approximately 2.4 million subscribers, which was a 3.55% decrease from a year earlier. In 2015, its number of subscribers…
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By Denis Carmel
QUEBEC – Former CRTC Commissioner, Suzanne Lamarre is heavily involved in the government of Québec’s effort to speed the deployment of high-speed internet in rural and remote regions funded through the Québec Branché program.
We first heard of this when Bell issued a news release on October 30, announcing new measures to simplify the process of having access to its support structures. The same day, the CRTC announced potential regulatory measures to make access to poles owned by Canadian carriers more efficient.
“To accelerate the implementation of funded projects and meet deadlines, the Quebec government has set…
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GATINEAU — Edmonton’s Akash Broadcasting today received approval from the CRTC to acquire the ethnic radio station CKER-FM (World FM 101.7) from Rogers Sports and Media and to obtain a new broadcasting licence to continue the station’s operation.
However, Akash’s request for an exception to the payment of tangible benefits resulting from the transaction, due to the economic impact of Covid-19, has been denied by the Commission in its decision today.
This will be Akash’s first radio station in Edmonton. It currently owns and operates CJCN-FM in Surrey, B.C., also a commercial ethnic radio station. The broadcaster has said…
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OTTAWA – The INDU committee’s “first start” is already under way for the most part thanks to the CRTC and the telecom industry.
The standing committee on Industry, Science and Technology (INDU) presented a report to the House of Commons on Friday entitled Fraudulent Calls in Canada: A Federal Government’s First Start.
“Fraud calls cause significant losses to Canadians,” says the committee. “Supported by fraudulent offshore call centres and easily accessible technologies, such as robocalls and spoofing, fraudsters manage to deliver scams despite the best efforts of law enforcement agencies. To make things worse, the Covid-19 pandemic led to a significant…
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By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – In our last story about Bill C-10, the long-awaited Act to amend the Broadcasting Act, Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault wanted to proceed quickly to and through second reading. Passage from second reading is normally a prerequisite before a bill goes to the Heritage Committee for study.
That was two weeks ago. Word is that debate could resume Friday, December 4, along with Bill C-11 on Privacy Protection.
Considering the House will break for the Holidays on December 11, there is slight chance the Committee will start sitting this year, possibly with government presenting the bill to…
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By Robert Ghiz
CANADA’S REGULATORS HAVE long recognized that facilities-based competition is the best way to achieve the objectives of high-quality services, wide network coverage, and affordable prices. Favouring facilities-based competition has resulted in billions of dollars of private investment, building the fastest mobile wireless networks in the world. Even in rural areas Canada’s networks perform better than the overall networks in most other countries.
This combination of quality and coverage, together with an intensely competitive mobile wireless market evidenced by a steady decline in prices, is why a recent report commissioned by the U.S. wireless industry association…
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By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – Foreign-based vendors with no physical presence in Canada do not have to charge Canadians GST/HST on sales of digital products or services — like mobile apps, online video gaming (not to mention purchases within apps and games) and video and music streaming. Nor do they pay taxes on earnings from Canadian consumers.
In today’s economic statement from the federal government, however, foreign-based vendors selling digital products or services to consumers in Canada (such as Netflix, Spotify and others) will be required to register for, collect and remit the GST/HST on their taxable sales to Canadian consumers.
The…
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By Ahmad Hathout
OTTAWA – The task of figuring out how the different broadband programs of the federal government and the CRTC will be co-ordinated was made a little easier by the regulator’s chairman Ian Scott on Thursday.
Posed with a question from a member of parliament about whether the CRTC should have control of the entire broadband budget — not just the regulator’s own $750-million Broadband Fund — Scott said the different programs have different focuses, and funding could come down to how those programs measure connected areas.
Earlier this year, rural economic development minister Maryam Monsef announced the UBF has…
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