GATINEAU – Unless there is a last minute change of heart from one side or the other, a panel of three CRTC commissioners will soon decide the terms of the next carriage agreements for 29 Bell Media specialty channels on a number of independent BDUs.
The Commission panel will choose one offer over the other in the final stage – known as Final Offer Arbitration (FOA), sometimes referred to as “baseball arbitration” – of this carriage battle. It’s high-risk business brinksmanship. In Major League Baseball, if a player and his team can’t come to a negotiated salary agreement, an arbitrator is appointed who hears both sides of the arguments and selects a winner.
This is what will happen on Friday when the Canadian Independent Distributors group (Cogeco Cable, EastLink, MTS, Canadian Cable Systems Alliance) and Telus face off against Bell Media in front of the commissioner-arbitrators. Plainly put, the distributors do not want to be forced to package the Bell Media specialty channels the way Bell is demanding (nor pay the rates that the mandated packaging causes) – which is also the way Bell says all other BDUs have agreed to, and are abiding by.
We have covered the hearings and overall battle extensively and the players have even taken directly to Cartt.ca to express their viewpoints to our readers. Please click the link above which will take you to some excellent background coverage.
FOA is a rather rare occurrence in the annals of Canadian TV regulation and no one has ever pushed the final decision on a carriage agreement into the hands of a panel of CRTC commissioner-arbitrators to pick a winner. The commissioners want the companies work these things out through regular negotiations. However, if they are forced to pick, as seems certain will happen now, one will win, the other will lose.
As the CRTC said in its letter to the parties outlining procedure, once Friday’s hearing is done, “The Commission will then review both agreements and choose one in its entirety. The Commission will not select provisions from both agreements and create a third agreement. The Commission shall then require the party who has not signed the agreement to execute it and this agreement shall constitute the affiliation agreement between the parties for the term of the agreement. As stated in Information Bulletin 2009-38, final offer arbitration before the Commission will result in a binding determination.”
(Ed note: One wonders that no matter which side wins the Friday face-off, the whole matter is just going to end up in the courts, or as an appeal to federal cabinet.)
On Friday in an in-camera (non-public) session, Bell Media and the CIDG – which no longer includes Telus at this stage of the fight as it and the other independents thought it better if its issues were decided separately – will face the commissioners at 9 a.m., with Telus and Bell going at 1:30.
Sources at the Commission have told Cartt.ca the goal is to get the decision out within 10 working days, however the FOA expedited process says the Regulator has until the final week of July.
