By Ahmad Hathout
OTTAWA – The task of figuring out how the different broadband programs of the federal government and the CRTC will be co-ordinated was made a little easier by the regulator’s chairman Ian Scott on Thursday.
Posed with a question from a member of parliament about whether the CRTC should have control of the entire broadband budget — not just the regulator’s own $750-million Broadband Fund — Scott said the different programs have different focuses, and funding could come down to how those programs measure connected areas.
Earlier this year, rural economic development minister Maryam Monsef announced the UBF has eliminated the oft-criticized “hexagon” model, a 25 square-kilometre mapping method to determine what areas have access to certain levels of connectivity. If just one household in that hexagon has access to 50/10 speeds, for example, the entire area making up the hexagon would be considered “connected” and not eligible for funding. This has left hundreds of rural regions without access to government broadband funds.
That model was replaced at the federal government level by a model that will measure connectivity within 230 metres. It was not, however, eliminated with the CRTC’s Broadband Fund, which had already gone through the first round of applications when Monsef announced the change. The Broadband Fund has already closed its second round of applications with no word on if there will be subsequent rounds.
“If there’s one [connected] person in the 25 square kilometre hexagon and it isn’t eligible for our fund…it [can be] eligible for the [Universal Broadband Fund],” Scott said, using an example of how the different funds can move fluidly from one to the other.
The comment places an emphasis on the accuracy of the data collection and mapping methods of the regulator and UBF-administrator Innovation Canada. The data is collected from an assortment of sources, including through surveys, and consultations with internet service providers, federal partners, industry associations, provinces and others, ISED says.
Scott added there will be massive projects that will seek funding, one of which could, by itself, demand the entire $750 million, so those are best left to better capitalized programs.
“I think there are some large projects that might be better suited to having the Infrastructure Bank address them, there are some that are more suited to the government’s Universal Broadband Fund [UBF] — our fund is focusing on where there is no one receiving the basic service objective” of 50 Mbps download and 10 Mbps upload, Scott said.
“We rely on the record of a proceeding, so we have received applications for review-and-vary, we have received comments or submissions from other parties, and that is the basis from which we will make our decision.” – Ian Scott, CRTC
The Infrastructure Bank last month announced $2-billion is available for broadband projects, while the UBF received an additional $750 million for a total of $1.75 billion when a call for applications was made earlier this month.
The committee also touched on cellphone bills, which was expected. Asked by NDP MP Brian Masse, who has been a stalwart for lower telecom prices for Canadians, insisting Canada has some of the highest-priced data plans in the world, Scott treaded a fine line, as he had done throughout his testimony.
“Comparisons are hard,” he said, alluding to Canada’s rank in the world on cost per gigabyte of data. “We do need to look at them carefully. But you are right — we have higher prices. We also, though, have a very high standard of coverage — 98% of Canadians have access to LTE, the latest and most modern technology — that’s not true in many of those countries, including our neighbours to the south.”
A number of surveys have highlighted Canada’s dubious rank among other countries on this issue. “We have a problem about pricing and affordability, and that is what we’re focused on at the moment in our major review of wireless,” Scott said.
Another major issue that was put to the day’s witnesses, which included Matt Stein of the Competitive Network Operators Consortium (CNOC) and representatives from internet advocates OpenMedia, was the spectacle of wholesale rates. This month, the major carriers filed a request with the Supreme Court of Canada to review a decision by the Federal Court of Appeal that dismissed their challenge of the CRTC’s decision to lower the wholesale internet rate.
CNOC head Stein expressed concern that the federal government — which said in an order-in-council this summer that it believed the CRTC erred in its August 2019 decision but declined to send the decision back to the regulator because it was already relooking at it — was backing away from its previous commitments to lower telecom prices for Canadians.
Meanwhile, Scott was asked whether the cabinet’s order-in-council will factor into the regulator’s decision.
“Our decision-making process is always independent,” Scott said. “We rely on the record of a proceeding, so we have received applications for review-and-vary, we have received comments or submissions from other parties, and that is the basis from which we will make our decision.”
