OTTAWA – When it does launch its digital television service, Telus doesn’t want to jump through the Commission’s hoops every time it needs to make a competitive move to match Shaw, the western telco has told the CRTC.
Telus needs to be competitively nimble, so to have to ask the Commission for permission to make certain programming additions or alterations poses problems, it says, because it won’t be able to respond in a timely enough manner in its markets.
When contacted by www.cartt.ca today, and asked about the application, which was filed on December 13, 2004 and only made public today, Telus senior regulatory legal counsel Ann Mainville-Neeson said, “it’s these delays that have somewhat prompted the application.”
Mainville-Neeson called the filing an “omnibus application so we can match what the incumbent in our area is doing without having to always re-apply.”
In the notice, which calls for comments, Telus has asked the Commission to amend its Alberta and British Columbia cable licenses so that it can:
* distribute the same Part 2 Eligible satellite services and Canadian distant signals on the same basis as the incumbent in the market, regardless of when the incumbent received its authorization to distribute the services or signals on that basis, and without the need for a further regulatory process.
* distribute the same ethnic audio programming services as the incumbent is authorized to distribute, regardless of when the incumbent received its authorization, and without the need for a further regulatory process.
* be authorized to receive directly through its own broadband facilities, at its option, any of the Canadian signals set out in the Lists of Eligible Satellite services that are otherwise required to be received from a licensed satellite relay distribution undertaking (SRDU).
* be authorized to replace, at its option, any of its authorized U.S. 4+1 signals with the signal of a different affiliate of the same network located in the same time zone as that of the licensed area and received from a licensed SRDU.
It’s that “regulatory process” which bugs Telus the most, as pointed out on www.cartt.ca by Telus senior vice-president Janet Yale last week. “When it comes to us entering into television service, the BDU rules are actually quite time-consuming,” she said. “We changed the signal source for some of our Telus TV signals and the amendment itself took 14 months. All we were trying to do is change the source for the U.S. 3+1s from one city to another… and that’s a 14-month process. There were no negative interventions, the paper just takes that long.”
Adds the Telus application: “In the continued preparation for commercial launch, Telus filed on June 1, 2004 further applications seeking, amongst other things, authority to match certain other services already distributed by the incumbent cable BDU in Telus’ licensed areas. Specifically, Telus noted that the licence amendments requested, if approved, would simply permit Telus to offer the same services in the same manner as the incumbent cable operator in the respective markets. To that end, Telus submitted the requested amendments were non-controversial, would have no adverse impact on local licensed programming undertakings in the respective markets and would provide for competitive parity.
“Four months later, on October 7, 2004, the Commission published the Telus applications and established November 12, 2004 as the deadline for the receipt of public comments (Broadcasting Public Notice CRTC 2004-76). Assuming for the sake of argument the Commission approves these applications and issues its decisions by February 1, 2005, it will have taken another eight months for Telus to receive the authority simply to match more of the same services that the incumbent cable BDU has been offering in the same markets for some time,” it says.
As the regs now stand, Telus, as do other BDUs, must clear many things with the Commission such as altering the source of its U.S. 4+1s, for example. The rules also say that BDUs must also take any distant, out-of-market Canadian broadcast signals from a licensed satellite relay distribution undertaking (SRDU).
Since the only two licensed SRDUs in Canada are Shaw-owned Star Choice and BCE’s Bell ExpressVu, the western telco might find paying either one more than absolutely necessary somewhat unpalatable.
Mainville-Neeson said however, that it’s just a matter of ease, since the company has a nationwide network, it doesn’t need an SRDU to deliver any distant broadcast signals. “We have a fibre backbone,” she explained, “so it doesn’t make sense to have to get them through an SRDU.”
Comments are due to the Commission by July 27th.
