OTTAWA – Canadian Heritage minister Bev Oda said it would be “inappropriate to prejudge its review” of the Canadian Television Fund (CTF) currently underway by the CRTC, in her response earlier this week to a Parliamentary committee’s report on the private-public fund.
The government’s response to the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage’s “The Funding Crisis of the Canadian Television Fund,” offered no opinions on the report’s conclusions.
Oda’s response consisted of a summary of events surrounding the funding crisis resulting when Shaw and Quebecor decided to withdraw their monthly contributions to the CTF. Those payments have since been resumed….
Continue Reading
BANFF – Although the combination of two major regulated TV assets was the talk of the 2007 Banff World Television Festival (Hello, Rogers/Citytv), the focus of the event’s final panel was on the potential impact of unregulated new media vs. the fortunes of old media.
In fact, the first question posed by moderator (and festival CEO) Robert Montgomery during his closing session on the BWTVF green Paper to the diverse collection of opinion leaders was: Will the TV industry collapse in the face of broadband Internet and other unregulated platforms?
The question may sound like a Chicken Little approach…
Continue Reading
by Myron Love
WINNIPEG – Having secured the approval of the CRTC, MTS Allstream has begun the process of doubling its pay phone rate from 25 cents to 50 cents a call – despite complaints from advocates of the poor who argue that the increase should have phased in over a period of time.
"We haven’t increased our rates since 1983," says MTS spokesman Michael Bouliane. "Ontario and Quebec already charge 50 cents to use pay phones, Saskatchewan is awaiting CRTC approval and Telus has charged pay phone users 35 cents a call for some time now."
Bouliane…
Continue Reading
WINNIPEG – MTS Allstream has filed evidence with the CRTC saying that it has met the requisite Quality of Service ("QoS") criteria for deregulation of the residential local telephone market in Winnipeg.
The QoS evidence is the last benchmark incumbent telcos are required to meet in order to obtain forbearance or deregulation in local markets.
The ILECs must provide adequate service to their new competition when the newcomers require interconnection to the PSTN, for example.
"We think the current requirements for QoS are fair and achievable," said Chris Peirce, chief regulatory officer, MTS Allstream, in the company’s press release….
Continue Reading
TORONTO –Corus Entertainment Inc. announced Monday it has inked a $1.1 million agreement to buy Sherbrooke radio station CIGR-FM (Génération Rock) from Groupe Génération Rock Inc.
The sale is subject to the approval of the CRTC.
“Corus Entertainment is committed to strengthening our radio presence in Québec,” said Corus Entertainment president and CEO John Cassaday. “The addition of Génération Rock is consistent with our growth strategy and will now offer a companion to our heritage news-talk station.”
Corus also owns the Sherbrooke-based CHLT-AM, which switches to FM at the end of June.
Groupe Génération Rock Inc. is majority owned…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – New CRTC chair Konrad von Finckenstein joined attendees on the last day of the Canadian Telecom Summit on Wednesday to recap a year of “considerable drama” in the telecom industry and to offer some perspective on what needs to happen next in terms of regulatory review and change.
Highlights for the past year included the Ministry of Industry’s policy direction regarding greater reliance on market forces in the telecom industry, the government’s variances of the CRTC’s previous decisions on regulation of local services using Voice over IP and on local service forbearance, and the mandating of an…
Continue Reading
OTTAWA-GATINEAU – Ten-digit telephone dialing will hit Alberta starting in June 2008.
The CRTC has added Alberta’s two area codes, 403 and 780, to the growing list of regions requiring people to dial the area codes even when calling local numbers. The commission says the Canadian Numbering Administrator predicts that area code 403, serving Calgary and southern Alberta, will run out of telephone numbers by March 2009, while Edmonton and northern Alberta’s 780 code will exhaust its supply by October 2009.
The booming province has exceeded previous forecasts for telephone demand—as recently as 2004, the numbers were expected to…
Continue Reading
QUEBEC CITY – The Supreme Court of Canada has rejected efforts by Genex Communications, owners of this city’s troublesome CHOI-FM, to appeal the non-renewal of its licence ordered by the CRTC in July 2004.
However, while some believed that would mean the silencing of CHOI once and for all, that doesn’t seem to be the case.
CHOI remains on the air, despite the Supreme Court’s ruling Thursday, because of a behind-the-scenes deal between Genex, the would-be new station owner and licence-holder, Radio Nord Communications Inc., and MBL Communication Média.
MBL, which had expressed interest in competing for CHOI’s frequency…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – Citytv Toronto will leave its long-time home inside the CHUMCity building within three years as part of Rogers Media’s deal to buy the Toronto station and four others across the country.
Announced yesterday, Rogers has signed a deal to acquire Citytvs in Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver for $375 million from CTVglobemedia. The new deal nullifies the Rogers purchase of the A Channels from CTV, which will now hold on to those assets.
The agreement came together rather quickly, since the CRTC only announced its decision on Friday. The two companies were able to move…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – Recommendations by the Telecommunications Policy Review (TPR) panel, published in its March 2006 report, may have taken a step closer to implementation today with the release of a “Model Telecommunications Act”, co-authored by a former TPR panel member, Hank Intven, partner of the law firm McCarthy Tétrault LLP.
Attendees of the Canadian Telecom Summit received copies of the 456-page “Model Act” this afternoon during a special presentation by Intven and his co-author, Mary Dawson, a former associate deputy minister of justice and independent advisor to McCarthy Tétrault.
The TPR report released last year called for a more…
Continue Reading
