Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez and Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne on Monday sent a letter to new Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) chair and CEO Vicky Eatrides, congratulating her on her appointment and outlining the government’s vision and priorities for Canada’s telecommunications and broadcasting sectors.
Eatrides started her five-year term last month, replacing replaces Ian Scott as head of the CRTC. While her predecessor’s tenure was called “disastrous for public confidence” in the regulator by one telecom expert, Eatrides said in a recent interview that she is “very focused on competition.”
The new CRTC chair is an expert in federal regulatory law and a career enforcer of pro-competition policies. However, Ministers Rodriguez and Champagne highlighted in their letter that public confidence in the CRTC has been dwindling as of late.
“Unfortunately, our sense is that public confidence and trust in the CRTC has waned in recent years,” they wrote, continuing:
Over the course of our mandates, we have spoken and engaged with Canadians, parliamentarians, stakeholders, academics, and civil society on their experiences with, and perceptions of, the CRTC. While there is broad and strong support for an independent and effective CRTC, we consistently heard that the organization falls short in three areas:
- Timeliness of decision making
- Accessibility of CRTC processes to the public, non-corporate interest groups, and civil society
- Openness and transparency
According to the feds, there is a perception that the CRTC takes too long to make decisions. The letter urged Eatrides to accelerate decision-making at the CRTC while maintaining fair and equal processes.
Peter Nowak, Vice President of Insight & Engagement at independent internet provider TekSavvy, pointed out that the federal government is urging Eatrides to make quicker decisions while Ottawa is still yet to finalize its telecom policy direction.
The federal government's letter to new #CRTC chair Vicky Eatrides urges her to move faster, yet we've been waiting 8 months and counting for the feds to finalize their "new" telecom policy direction https://t.co/PvimpFqZRH
— Peter Nowak (@peternowak) February 6, 2023
The letter to Eatrides outlined the federal government’s agenda for both telecommunications and digital media, also touching on the controversial Bills C-11 (the Online Streaming Act) and C-18 (the Online News Act).
“Together, the proposed Online Streaming Act, Online News Act, and Digital Charter Implementation Act, as well as a future legislation on online safety, represent core pillars of our digital policy agenda.”
Click here to read the full text of the letter.
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These three issues pale next to the previous chairman being a very active participant in the Robellus old-boys club, eh. Our very own version of Ajit Pai of the FCC. But I guess that was “officially not proven”.
Anyway, good things to improve upon.
I think they can find words stronger than “waning trust” that illustrate how people who are even aware of the CRTC feel about them. I’ll give it a shot, at best they’re a useless paper lion that does nothing meaningful to help the public, at worst they’re a corrupt government organization that exists to help corporations scam the public through collusion, corruption and Swiss cheese laws.
The CRTC should never be meeting with any corporation’s employees of any kind, including lobbyists and CEO’s etc, outside of a public forum.
IMO somebody out there really likes Vicky Eatrides as she was handed a job where there is no possible way she could bring the CRTC down any lower in respectability and has nowhere to go but up and improve.
I hope she can “pull a rabbit out of her hat” and bring this entity back from the brink but I got to admit, I have my doubts.