Regulatory delay — the glacial pace of CRTC decision making — can slow investment in Canadian communications infrastructure.
Communications networks don’t stand still. Years before customers ever run a speed test, capital is committed for fibre placement and activation, towers are built, and spectrum gets deployed. But, while technology is moving at the pace of innovation, regulation often moves at the pace of… well, regulation.
That gap is becoming a problem.
Over the past few years, I’ve written frequently about the tension between policy ambition and the practical realities of building and operating communications infrastructure. Examples include earlier posts on regulatory uncertainty, flip-flops on wholesale access frameworks, and my recent post on the pace of CRTC proceedings which led to the Federal Government needing to provide emergency band-aid support for CPAC.
The communications sector is continually being asked to do more — connect rural communities, harden networks against extreme weather, support AI workloads, expand 5G, and prepare for 6G — all while competition intensifies, driving prices lower. Yet the regulatory machinery that governs the companies making these multi-billion dollar investments continues to grind at a seemingly glacial pace.
This mismatch has consequences.
Regulatory delay directly affects decisions about capital allocation. When approvals, pricing frameworks, or access rules take years to finalize, uncertainty can freeze or slow corporate investment decisions. Capital is mobile; it will flow to jurisdictions where the rules of the game are clear.
We’ve seen this dynamic play out repeatedly, despite the government’s Policy Direction to the CRTC requiring regulation that is efficient, timely, and proportionate:
- Delayed decisions on wholesale access create uncertainty about returns on fibre builds.
- Slow spectrum policy processes leave operators unable to plan long‑term network evolution.
- Protracted consultations on resilience, consumer protections, or competition rules introduce risk premiums into investment models.
In an infrastructure-driven sector needing billions of dollars in annual capital investment, regulatory indecision is effectively a hidden tax on progress.
Our government says it wants more investment, more competition, more innovation. Yet the very processes designed to achieve those goals can inadvertently be undermined through regulatory delay.
Just last week, the CRTC launched a public consultation on developing a methodology for mobile coverage reporting. But as the Globe and Mail reported, the Commission “issued its request for comments nine months after it received the recommendations on which it is now asking for feedback, and three years after François-Philippe Champagne, then minister of innovation, science and industry, issued a policy directive ordering the telecom agency to develop and implement a standardized and robust approach for reporting mobile wireless coverage.”
Another recent example is the CRTC’s multi‑year consultations on network resilience and outage reporting. While the intent is sound — we all want more resilient networks — the process has become sprawling, reactive, and increasingly prescriptive. As I’ve written before, when regulators ask “which measures should be mandatory?” before understanding feasibility or cost, the result is predictable: companies pause, waiting to see what obligations will ultimately be imposed. Unfortunately, the longer the regulator takes to decide, the longer the delay in making investments in resiliency.
It took 5 years from the launch of a consultation (in October 2020), until the CRTC finalized rates (in October 2025) for competitors to attach fibre to telephone company poles. Last Friday, Bell filed an application for a Commission review, saying the CRTC made a number of errors in calculating the “final” rates.
It isn’t just the CRTC. There have been issues with the political nature of spectrum licensing – an issue that led the 2006 Telecom Policy Review Panel to recommend removing the function from ISED and transferring it to a more independent regulatory body (the CRTC). Last summer I wrote about the Court admonishing the Department in handling Mobilicity’s spectrum transfer, and awarding damages in the hundreds of millions of dollars:
At its core, this action is about the transferability of spectrum licenses. But significantly, it is also about the extraordinary and unusual conduct of Government officials with respect to the Mobilicity spectrum licenses in particular.
A week and a half ago, another judicial case found that ISED had been unreasonable in rejecting the transfer of some 700MHz spectrum from Xplore Mobile to TELUS. The decision refers to the Department’s analysis invoking a criterion undisclosed to the applicants, “in preference to the more fact-based and nuanced arguments advanced by Xplore and TELUS.” As such, “ISED’s decision to reject the Licence Transfer Application was therefore unreasonable as well as procedurally unfair.”
Around the world, telecom regulators struggle to keep pace with technological change. The countries that will win the investment race are certain to have one thing in common: regulatory clarity.
Not necessarily deregulation. Not necessarily lighter regulation. Just faster, smarter, more predictable regulation.
Investors are able to price risk. How do they put a price on ambiguity?
Regulatory delay can have a compounding effect: rural builds get pushed out; urban densification slows; new entrants hesitate; equipment procurement cycles slip; and, innovation ecosystems lose momentum. Perhaps most importantly, Canada risks falling behind in the global competition for digital infrastructure — the foundation upon which AI, advanced manufacturing, and the next generation of services will depend.
If Canada wants to attract and retain private capital for communications infrastructure, regulators need to rethink not just what they decide, but how they decide.
Three principles could help:
- Time‑bound decisions: Set firm timelines — and stick to them (such as US “Shot Clock” regulations). Uncertainty is often more damaging than an unfavourable ruling.
- Evidence-based decision making: Policy should follow data, not narratives. As I’ve noted before, telecom prices have been falling for years, despite political rhetoric to the contrary.
- Regulatory humility: Not every problem requires a new rule. Sometimes the best decision is to let the marketplace work.
Communications companies are ready to invest billions of dollars of capital, and have the expertise to deploy technologies that power the digital economy. What is needed is a regulatory and policy environment moving at something closer to the speed of the industry being governed.
In a world where connectivity underpins everything from economic growth to national security, Canada can not afford continued regulatory delay.