GATINEAU and QUEBEC – The CRTC has postponed Nov. 14th public hearings in Quebec City on a bundle of applications for new or modified radio services, all because of a sales agreement two weeks ago involving one of the region’s FM stations.
The decision puts 10 applications on hold, including seven for new FM radio stations and one for a licence renewal for a station in the Gaspé region, about 700 km away.
Three other applications for new services will be heard, but in Gatineau instead of Quebec City. One is for a French-language country music station on the AM…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The CRTC told all companies selling voice over Internet protocol (VOIP) service that they must be diligent when it comes to telling customers what they can and can’t do with 911.
Today’s CRTC edict requires all local voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) service providers in Canada to provide specific notification to current and prospective customers regarding the availability, characteristics and limitations of their 911 and Enhanced 911 (E911) service. All local VoIP service providers will have to implement these requirements within 90 days of this decision.
Some of the notification requirements are:
* VoIP 911 service has…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – Look for a local telephony price battle in Montreal.
The CRTC took a first step towards local telephony deregulation on Thursday when it granted – on an interim basis – Bell Canada’s request to price its voice over IP service differently in different regions. Until now, if telcos wanted to drop prices, it had to drop prices across its entire footprint and could not target certain markets.
However, in Quebec, MSO Videotron is offering local telephony for as little as $16 a month and Bell is losing thousands of customers per week.
Bell doesn’t face similar pricing…
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OTTAWA – The Government of Canada Wednesday dismissed complaints filed with the Governor in Council over two CRTC decisions awarding Vancouver radio station licenses.
On July 21, 2005, the CRTC awarded a radio license to South Asian Broadcasting Corporation Inc. to operate a new commercial specialty FM (ethnic) radio station at Vancouver at 93.1 MHz aimed at the South Asian community.
The same day, it also approved an AM radio application by I.T. Productions Ltd. for a new station at 1200 kHz also targeting Vancouver’s South Asian communities.
“The decisions… were found to be consistent with the policy objectives…
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OTTAWA – The Canadian Association of Broadcasters has asked the CRTC to defer its planned review of the Canadian radio sector for at least 24 months.
The CAB is of the view that current radio policy is working well enough for now and the Commission should wait and analyze the impact of the new subscription radio services about to hit the market before embarking on a re-do of Canadian radio policy.
The Canadian broadcast industry has been waiting for a CRTC public notice announcing the much-delayed review and is now hoping it can be put off further.
“It is…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC says it’s “pleased” that the Federal Court of Appeal has upheld the commission’s decision not to renew the broadcasting licence of CHOI-FM in Quebec City.
“This is an important decision for Canadians,” says CRTC Chair Charles Dalfen. “It confirms the CRTC’s approach in protecting Canadians against abusive comments and personal attacks on the airwaves.”
The Federal Court yesterday denied CHOI’s appeal of the commission’s decision, saying the CRTC correctly applied the principles of natural justice and procedural fairness in arriving at its decision.
CHOI was under scrutiny for comments made by former host Jeff Fillion….
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GATINEAU – The CRTC has called for comments on proposed changes to the Broadcasting Distribution Regulations that would clarify linkage requirements for Class 1 and 2 BDUs.
The changes would require:
– that Category 1 services and Category 2 services be distributed in accordance with the distribution and linkage requirements for Class 1 and Class 2 licensees;
– that the community programming of a licensed community programming undertaking be given mandatory carriage as part of the basic service by Class 1 and Class 2 licensees that do not elect to distribute their own community programming; and
– continued distribution…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC has turned down a request from a non-profit group in British Columbia to get relief from TELUS Communications Inc. with its phone rates.
The Royal Canadian Air Cadets 828 Hurricane Squadron wanted the telco to allow qualifying non-profit organizations to have two individual phone lines at residential rates instead of business rates. TELUS does so in Alberta, but its General Tariff for B.C. does not.
The cadets wanted TELUS to define customers given rate relief to include churches, youth groups, veterans’ associations, associations for the elderly or infirm, and community centres. It argued that residential…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC has renewed the licences for several specialty networks for seven years, including APTN (Aboriginal Peoples Television Network), which was granted an increase in the subscriber fee to $0.25 a month, up from $0.15.
The extra revenue will help APTN acquire more Aboriginal programs in underrepresented categories such as dramas, live musical concerts, and children’s programs and will allow the network to make the move to high definition television during the licence term.
“This decision makes it possible for the network to continue to grow and expand our programming in ways we couldn’t in the past,”…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC today released some local phone market data ahead of its 2005 Monitoring Report, expected to be published this October.
The commission felt some of the information could be useful now to companies and intervenors preparing for the public consultation hearing to be held in Gatineau in late September regarding a framework for forbearing existing local phone companies from regulation of residential and business local exchange services.
The data released today, covering the years 2000 to 2004, include the number of local, residential, business, and wholesale lines in Canada; and the percentage of those…
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