OTTAWA – The Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications started to examine how the three federal communications statutes (the Telecommunications Act, the Broadcasting Act, and the Radiocommunication Act) can be modernized In light of the evolution of the broadcasting and telecommunications sectors in the last decades.
Last week they heard from university professors and today, Konrad von Finckenstein, former chair of the CRTC, and the Commissioner of Competition met the committee.
Von Finckenstein submitted six points for the Committee to examine. “First, in the reform of our communication legislation, examine everything from an Internet-centric point of view. To borrow a phrase from Bill Clinton: ‘It’s the Internet, stupid,’” he said.
“Second, merge two statutes – the Radiocommunications Act and the Telecommunications Act,” he added, not Broadcasting and Telecommunications as he stated numerous times before but the Radiocommunications and Telecommunications Acts, and one minister and one regulator should be responsible for both wire-line and wireless communications. Having the CRTC responsible for wireline and Innovation, Science and Economic Development for the other makes no sense.
Three, avoid any efforts to strengthen the present broadcasting regulatory system based on access control.
Four, create separate agencies for the regulation of telecommunications and broadcasting. The very different nature of broadcasting and telecommunications regulation demands regulators with very different profiles of knowledge and competencies. In broadcast regulation, the aim is to combine legislative goals with popular program demands. This is not made easier by the fact that everyone who has a TV or radio assumes he knows and understands broadcasting. Everyone has a well-formed view of what should be on TV, what the CBC should air or what should be produced or aired. In addition, the media love reporting on broadcasting issues in length and in depth, said von Finckenstein.
In contrast, telecommunications is a technical field. Few people understand it, the economics are difficult to grasp, the technology being employed is complex and the implications of technological choices on competition and consumer choice are difficult to discern. Last of all, the jargon is very dense. However, telecommunications is by far the more critical to the health of the economy as a whole and actually impacts individual Canadians and businesses in greater measure than do any issues that face the broadcasting regulator.
“We have a cultural policy to favour Canadian production, but we discrimination against Canadian distributors in favour of American ones. I have never quite understood the rationale.” – Konrad von Finckenstein
Hence, different skill sets are required, he continued, and having one regulator address both tasks inevitably results in telecommunications issues being seen through a broadcast lens. This does not make for good Internet regulation.
Five, recommend to the government that in light of the very different nature of broadcasting and telecommunications, a different minister should be solely responsible for each act. The current division between Heritage and ISED leads to unnecessary gridlock.
Lastly, provide for a means to exchange information between the various agencies involved in some aspect of communications. Current legislative restraints make meaningful cooperation between the CRTC, the Commissioner of Competition and the Privacy Commissioner difficult, if not impossible, yet they should be working in unison to confront the serious issues of the Internet.
Responding to a question by independent Liberal Senator Dawson, von Finckenstein said he had met Janet Yale, the Chair of the Broadcasting and Telecommunication Legislative Review Panel (BTLR), and she had sought his views in private – and added he did not understand why this Senate Committee and the federal government’s Review Panel sere studying the same thing at the same time. Senator Dawson said the Committee had decided to study the legislation at the same time, but they wanted to study in a public manner, not over lunch, and that they wanted to issue a report before the end of this Government’s mandate.
The BTLR issued its consultation document, as a coincidence, while the Committee met today.
A meeting of a Parliamentary Committee would not be complete without a mention of the so-called Netflix Tax: “What I think we should eliminate is some of the discrimination that we have these days, which, for the life of me, I don’t understand. If you subscribe to Netflix, you don’t pay HST. If you subscribe to CraveTV, which is the Canadian version, you pay. What on earth are we doing?
“We have a cultural policy to favour Canadian production, but we discrimination against Canadian distributors in favour of American ones. I have never quite understood the rationale. I’ve written about it. It makes no sense. Our trade policy is based on protecting cultural industry, and we have a cultural exemption under NAFTA, et cetera, but when it comes to this, we suddenly flip around and discriminate against our own. To me, it doesn’t make any sense,” said Mr. von Finckenstein
Future business of the Committee is unclear at this point. But we will keep monitoring
