TORONTO – Tuesday’s federal budget is being characterized as a “do-nothing” budget by opposition politicians and the “one before the big one” by business journalists, as Canada prepares for an election year in 2015. The small advances made in Budget 2014 to wireless telecommunications and broadband Internet policies would seem to support those views.
Tabled in the House of Commons along with Economic Action Plan 2014, the Canadian government’s Budget 2014 provided little real news value for the telecommunications sector. What was included amounted to a re-announcement of the federal government’s intentions with regard to capping wholesale domestic roaming fees and increasing broadband Internet service in rural and Northern communities.
Speaking to the House of Commons, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty (pictured in a cabinet meeting just prior to the budget release yesterday, a photo which was posted in the Finance Ministry’s Twitter feed) said the government’ s efforts to increase competition in the wireless sector has helped to reduce wireless rates in Canada by 20%. Furthermore, the government is “taking steps to lower wholesale roaming rates within Canada, and giving the CRTC the power to impose financial penalties on companies that do not comply with the rules.”
The accompanying Economic Action Plan 2014 document outlines the federal government’s proposal to amend the Telecommunications Act to cap wholesale domestic wireless roaming rates, to ensure wireless providers do not charge other companies more for mobile voice, data and text services than they charge their own customers. This legislative measure is intended to be in place until the CRTC announces its own decision on roaming rates.
In addition, the government plans to amend both the Telecommunications Act and Radiocommunication Act to enable the CRTC and Industry Canada to impose penalties on companies that violate other rules related to the Wireless Code, the deployment of spectrum, services to rural areas and tower sharing. All this had already been announced in December.
In terms of increasing broadband Internet deployment to rural and Northern communities, the federal government announced it will invest $305 million over five years “to extend and enhance access to high-speed broadband networks to a target speed of 5 megabits per second (Mbps) for up to an additional 280,000 Canadian households.”
This aspect of the budget announcement was met with approval by the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) in Ottawa and the SSi Group of Companies in Yellowknife.
“Canadians continue to need more choice, better service and lower prices for broadband Internet service." – Geoff White, PIAC
“Canadians continue to need more choice, better service and lower prices for broadband Internet service,” Geoff White, counsel to PIAC, noted in a press release. “Many consumers in rural or remote areas are not able to harness the full potential of the Internet.” In an interview with Cartt.ca, White said the federal government’s “Consumers First” approach to the budget is definitely welcome by PIAC.
“It’s a good start to say, ‘There’s 280,000 people who are unserved or underserved and we’re committed to closing that gap,’” White said. However, he added the CRTC set in 2010 an aspirational goal of having 5 Mbps broadband services available across the country by 2015, and that target has now been pushed forward to 2019 by the federal government’s budget announcement today.
“The government was saying today, ‘We’d like to see everybody have 5 Mbps in five years,’” White said. “So there’s a delay there, but the delay itself to me is a bit telling. It just shows that what was said in 2010 about market forces and government funding taking care of it may not necessarily have been true.”
SSi founder and CEO Jeff Philipp added: “Nowhere in this country is support to develop broadband more important than in the North, and we are very pleased that today’s budget pledges significant investments to help address the digital divide for people living here. This will allow for better and more affordable broadband.”
However, reaction to the federal government’s multi-million-dollar broadband Internet announcement was less favourable from Xplornet Communications. In a press release, Allison Lenehan, CEO, said his company is concerned the federal government may be trying to fix a problem that doesn’t exist.
“Broadband is already available in 100 per cent of rural Canada. Our near-term business plan already includes exceeding the stated 5 Mbps target for all Canadians well in advance of the CRTC’s timelines and going beyond." – Allison Lenehan, Xplornet
“Broadband is already available in 100 per cent of rural Canada. Our near-term business plan already includes exceeding the stated 5 Mbps target for all Canadians well in advance of the CRTC’s timelines and going beyond,” Lenehan said.
“Our goal is to improve capacity and speed for all rural Canadians beyond 10 Mbps,” he added, “but the only limitation is spectrum, not funding. The Minister has already announced (in November 2013) his intention to take back unused spectrum, which we support, but that needs to happen fast. The only thing standing between rural Canadians and faster speeds now and in the future is spectrum, not funding and not technology.”
PIAC’s White emphasized that he views today federal budget as “a statement of intent more than a concrete execution plan. A lot of these messages are very positive in terms of the broad strokes, but it’s the details that really will matter,” White said. “Some of the details are already starting to be hammered out on the regulatory side, but if the government acts first or changes the Telecom Act, that will obviously trump what the CRTC has to say about it.”
White added it is good to see the federal government and the telecom regulator are both considering these telecom issues actively and moving in the same direction. “It’s very positive that both the chairman of the CRTC and the government are signalling they’re taking this seriously and they want to change the status quo.”
However, it was a lack of change to the status quo in today’s federal budget that has raised concerns for members of Canada’s performing artist community. The Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists (ACTRA) voiced its disappointment with the government’s “lack of recognition and support for the Canadian film, television and digital media industry,” in a press release.
“This is yet another budget with no action on the part of this government to harness the enormous job-generating potential for our industry,” said Ferne Downey, ACTRA national president, said in the release. “Status quo isn’t good enough. To compete internationally, our industry needs to grow and evolve. That means solid, long-term investments and public policy that boosts production from coast to coast.”
ACTRA has asked in the past for the federal government to guarantee long-term funding for the CBC, NFB and Telefilm, and increased funding for the Canada Media Fund, none of which was addressed in today’s budget.
