AS WE MOVE INTO FALL, it’s getting closer and closer to the end of Charles Dalfen’s term as chairman of the CRTC.
His busy term expires at the end of the calendar year and he will apparently not be offered a second term.
According to a well-placed source in Ottawa, Dalfen was offered a one-year extension but he declined, asking the government to grant him another full five-year term or not at all.
So, who’s going to sit in the top chair at the Commission? Names that have been making the rounds among Ottawa communications types – and their regulatory friends elsewhere – include:
* Hank Intven, partner, McCarthy Tetrault
Intven was one of the co-authors of the Telecom Policy Review Report – that document the Conservative government says it wants to base future telecom policy on. He also helped write the 1993 Telecommunications Act, passed under the last Conservative government.
Intven has been with the law firm since 1986 after serving as executive director, telecom at the CRTC. He specializes in communications law, leading McCarthy’s telecom practice and has done extensive work at home and abroad.
"In recent years, Mr. Intven has worked on issues related to: Regulatory, business and financing issues involving Canadian and international telecommunications carriers including wireline, wireless, satellite, mobile, resale and competitive local exchange carriers (CLECs); Internet service providers (ISPs), IP telephony (VoIP) providers, cable TV licensees, radio, television and satellite broadcasting services, fixed wireless broadband video and data service providers, and providers and users of a wide range of telecom, broadcasting and other content services," says his bio on the law firm’s web site.
Intven’s main drawback is he doesn’t have much in the way of apparent broadcast experience.
* Alain Gourd, consultant.
Gourd is perhaps best-known as the former president and CEO of Cancom, and later, president of Bell Satellite Services (later called BCE Media). He was then brought into Bell Globemedia and retired in February of 2004 as BGM’s EVP corporate – mainly in charge of regulatory matters.
Gourd has government experience too. From 1985 to 1994, he was deputy minister of communications and then associate secretary and deputy clerk with the Privy Council Office.
While Gourd has satellite and broadcast familiarity, his CV lacks telecom experience
* Perrin Beatty, president, Canadian Manufacturers & Importers
The former CBC president’s name has been kicked around a little in Ottawa, but Beatty – also a former cabinet minister in Brian Mulroney’s government, doesn’t have any telecom experience and his stint at CBC is his only broadcast job.
He was Communications Minister from 1991 to 1993 and took his current job as a lobbyist in 1999. He also serves on the Advisory Council on National Security.
Other than his stint at the CBC, Beatty has little in the way of industry experience, especially recent familiarity with the communications market. His name seems to always crop up when a high profile government job pops up.
* Richard French, currently vice-chair telecom, CRTC
Having been in the vice-chair’s job for only about 19 months, French is considered a long-shot, but also interested in the job of chairman. Ottawa sources also told Cartt.ca that the current government wants to bring in someone not currently inside the Commission to lead it.
French is a former group vice-president with Bell Canada in three different areas of responsibility. He also established and ran as president and CEO Tata Communications, a mobile telecommunications joint venture between Bell Canada International and Industries PVT in India.
During the 1980s, he was a Quebec Liberal MLA and held provincial Cabinet positions as minister of communications, minister of technology, and minister of supply and services. He served in the Government of Canada at the Privy Council Office and the Department of Science and Technology.
* Fernand Belisle, consultant, 19 FB Inc.
Belisle, from the accounts we’ve received from our sources in Ottawa, is the favourite. He was secretary general of the CRTC in the 1980s and was appointed by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney as commissioner in the early 1990s, departing as vice-chair, broadcasting in 1998.
Prior to that he worked as controller and VP finance for Telemedia and has sat on the boards of Corus Entertainment and Cinar. Belisle currently sits on the board of Quebecor-controlled broadcaster TVA Group and Montreal-based mobile messaging company Lipso. He was chairman of the board of Canadian based Cable Satisfaction International – which ran Portuguese cable company Cabovisao, a company that Cogeco Cable just purchased out of bankruptcy protection.
No word yet on just when the official announcement on the new chair will happen.
Parliament returns today.
– Greg O’Brien
