TORONTO – While attendees of the Competitive Network Operators of Canada’s (CNOC) 2022 ISP Summit heard yesterday about the “unfriendly regulatory environment for competitors”, CNOC executive director and general counsel Geoff White highlighted today the reasons they have to still be optimistic about the future.
During his keynote speech titled “Where Do We Go From Here?”, White did not deny the last year has been difficult. He spoke about the recent wave of acquisitions in the industry (CNOC members VMedia and Distributel included), Rogers’ nationwide outage and the CRTC’s lack of movement on key files including one on disaggregated network configuration and one on emergency fibre resale.
(Not long after White’s speech, there was a long-awaited development on the mobile virtual network operator file – the CRTC finally released a decision on the tariffs associated with the framework, which had been filed for approval last July. White referred to the MVNO decision in his speech this morning as the “no-MVNO policy”. Afterwards, he argued the no-MVNO sentiment has only been cemented in today’s decision.)
White also noted last year they referred to “almost unfathomable” legal and regulatory battles and said they “always seem to be the underdogs, being blocked by the incumbents every step of the way.”
But he also emphasized they have “weathered that storm and will be entering 2023 with a renewed sense of optimism about being able to provide Canadians with choice and innovation…”
Why so hopeful?
The government’s proposed policy direction to the CRTC “makes it crystal clear that the federal government sees the benefit of competitors, and a fair wholesale access regime without the need for unrealistic infrastructure duplication,” White explained, adding they were “shocked” by the decision.
Shocked because it does away with the 2006 policy direction, “which privileged market forces over everything else and was used as the rationale for continued deregulation of the retail market for essential communications services,” he explained. It also, while replacing the 2019 policy direction, preserves the orders to the Commission to promote things like competition and affordability.
Noting the policy direction has not yet been finalized, White said in the meantime they are “encouraged that the Competition Bureau continues to pay very close attention to this space.”
Furthermore, he pointed out a new CRTC chair should be appointed in the coming months. “There should be no question that next chair must be bold, balanced, and un-beholden to the incumbents,” White said.
Hammering his point home with a Monty Python reference the crowd enjoyed, White told everyone that, “while we have been through tough times, we are certainly “not dead yet”, and with continued grit, and the 2022 policy direction coming into force, and a competent, unbiased CRTC chair, we will thrive.”
