The mandate letters for the Minister of Canadian Heritage and for the Minister of Justice and Attorney General each contain a section calling for the Ministers “to develop and introduce legislation as soon as possible to combat serious forms of harmful online content to protect Canadians and hold social media platforms and other online services accountable for the content they host”.

It is worth examining the report of the Joint Committee on the Draft Online Safety Bill, issued by the UK House of Lords and House of Commons in mid-December [pdf, 2.0 MB].

The UK report opens powerfully:

Self-regulation of online services has failed. Whilst the online world has revolutionised our lives and created many benefits, underlying systems designed to service business models based on data harvesting and microtargeted advertising shape the way we experience it. Algorithms, invisible to the public, decide what we see, hear and experience. For some service providers this means valuing the engagement of users at all costs, regardless of what holds their attention. This can result in amplifying the false over the true, the extreme over the considered, and the harmful over the benign.

The human cost can be counted in mass murder in Myanmar, in intensive care beds full of unvaccinated Covid-19 patients, in insurrection at the US Capitol, and in teenagers sent down rabbit holes of content promoting self-harm, eating disorders and suicide. This has happened because for too long the major online service providers have been allowed to regard themselves as neutral platforms which are not responsible for the content that is created and shared by their users. Yet it is these algorithms which have enabled behaviours which would be challenged by the law in the physical world to thrive on the internet. If we do nothing these problems will only get worse. Our children will pay the heaviest price. That is why the driving force behind the Online Safety Bill is the belief that these companies must be held liable for the systems they have created to make money for themselves.

At 193 pages, it is a lengthy but worthwhile read. The report includes 127 recommendations for the draft legislation over 25 pages in the report.

Having been involved in a number of projects and committees with the late human rights lawyer Alan Borovoy, I am sympathetic to his view that “We should not censor those making racist statements but censure them.” Professor Daniel Lyons of Boston College writes “Traditionally, the solution to bad speech is more speech, not censorship.” He expresses concern that attempting to control the flow of information online, like other attempts to craft digital legislation, can lead to unintended consequences.

Big Tech’s critics are correct that platforms can be misused to disseminate socially undesirable content online. But the remedy is to address the source of the problem — harmful users and the social conditions that make their messages attractive to others.

Still, it is difficult to reconcile how we can accept content in a digital stream which would be unacceptable in print, or as the UK paper writes, enabling “behaviours which would be challenged by the law in the physical world to thrive on the internet.”

Following its consultation process, those crafting new laws need to maintain a careful balance. Perhaps those involved in drafting Canada’s legislation should consider some of the UK recommendations in their initial draft.

“If we do nothing these problems will only get worse. Our children will pay the heaviest price.”

Are there policy and legislative changes that can help accelerate investment in next generation broadband networks?

Yes, according to a new report released last week by the CD Howe Institute. “Building Bridges for 5G: How to Overcome the Infrastructure Barriers to Deployment of Canada’s Next-Generation Broadband Networks” [pdf, 650KB] says, “The rollout of 5G requires expanded carrier access to the passive infrastructure”, from rooftops to bus stops and rights of way, that supports wireline and wireless telecommunications network facilities. “Canada’s regulatory framework needs an update to support timely and cost-effective deployment of these next-generation networks.”

The report was authored by Leslie Milton, Jay Kerr-Wilson, and Paul Burbank, all lawyers at Faskens with extensive experience in communications and competition law.

According to the report’s authors, the current regime for carrier access to passive infrastructure “is in need of serious amendment.”

There are seven key recommendations in the report:

• Recommendation 1: Amend the Telecommunications Act to make it explicit that carriers’ “qualified right of access” – that is, the right of carriers under the Act to access rights-of-way and other places for the construction, operation and maintenance of a transmission line – and the jurisdiction of the CRTC over such access encompass both wireline and wireless transmission facilities.
• Recommendation 2: Amend the Telecommunications Act to make it explicit that carriers’ qualified right of access and the CRTC’s jurisdiction over such access encompass all publicly owned land and railway rights-of-way, bridges and crossings.
• Recommendation 3: Amend the Telecommunications Act to make it explicit that the CRTC has jurisdiction to establish terms and conditions of carrier access to all publicly owned structures capable of supporting wireline and wireless transmission facilities, including municipal street furniture, as well as poles and conduit owned by provincial and municipal electric utilities and other utilities.
• Recommendation 4: Amend the Telecommunications Act to give the CRTC authority to establish generally applicable baseline standards for carrier access to rights-of-way, public places, and supporting infrastructure under its jurisdiction and to permit interested parties to seek a waiver of the standard terms on a case-by-case basis.
• Recommendation 5: Amend the Telecommunications Act to give the CRTC explicit authority to establish baseline federal standards for carrier access to multi-tenant buildings and to land under development for multi-tenant residential or commercial use that apply in the absence of substantially similar provincial regulation.
• Recommendation 6: Amend the Telecommunications Act to oblige the CRTC and parties to conduct dispute resolution proceedings quickly and efficiently in order to avoid delays and added expenses in obtaining approvals to build new facilities.
• Recommendation 7: Consult on amendments to Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada’s antenna-siting procedures to address small cell deployment and delays in antenna siting.

Some of these echo themes that I have discussed previously on these pages, including the discussion I had last week in “Building broadband better”.

Although Canada’s regulatory regime established exclusive federal jurisdiction for the regulation of telecommunications, there are “a number of amendments to the Telecommunications Act and ISED policy that would address the material gaps and mitigate the unnecessary uncertainty caused by the current legislative and regulatory framework”.

For example, the CRTC lacks authority to address access to railway rights-of-way, bridges and crossings, and the Commission has only been able to use indirect access to regulate competitive access to multi-tenant buildings and subdivisions. The CRTC determined that wireless facilities are not covered by the carrier access rights in the Telecommunications Act, and courts have held that the CRTC does not regulate access to electric utilities’ poles and conduits.

In addition, the approval processes for antenna sites can be painfully slow for service providers seeking to improve the quality of service to an area.

Governments at all levels are investing billions of dollars to accelerate investment in broadband infrastructure in underserved areas. As we see in the CD Howe report, some significant impediments to investment can be fixed with legislative modernization, ensuring carriers are able to secure timely and affordable access to rights-of-way and passive infrastructure for the deployment of next generation wireline and wireless network facilities.

It’s an important read.

This year, Bell Let’s Talk Day – the world’s biggest conversation about mental health – is taking place on January 26.

Bell’s commitment to support mental health is especially meaningful to me. Back in 2010, when Bell first announced its plans to support mental health initiatives, I wrote a post “Talking about unmentionables.” In that post, I observed that “I grew up on the grounds of a children’s psychiatric research institute in London, Ontario, the son of a child psychiatrist.” In a way, mental health is the family business. My father is a psychiatrist and two of my siblings are clinical psychologists. So you can understand why I am taking a little time to promote the day.

It’s pretty easy for everyone to show support, even if you aren’t a Bell customer, by using the “BellLetsTalk” hashtag on social media. Every call or text by Bell customers adds even more to Bell’s support of Canadian mental health programs.

On Bell Let’s Talk Day, Bell donates 5 cents to Canadian mental health programs for every applicable text, local or long distance call, tweet or TikTok video using #BellLetsTalk, every Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Snapchat, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube view of the Bell Let’s Talk Day video, and every use of the Bell Let’s Talk Facebook frame or Snapchat lens.

Over the past 11 years, there have been 1.3 billion messages of support, generating $121,373,806.75 in total Bell funding. #BellLetsTalk has become the most-used Canadian hashtag of all time.

I support Bell Let’s Talk initiative without reservation, and I encourage you to do so as well.

Keep being there for your friends and colleagues, keep listening to them, and on January 26, click to Tweet a message with #BellLetsTalk .

Today’s post takes a look at extending broadband to unserved areas, stimulated by a recent newspaper article and a New York state news release.

In Saturday’s Toronto Star, I read what I considered to be a superficially researched article about SpaceX Starlink broadband service: “‘Crazy good’: Rural Canadians are raving over Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite-based internet service. Should Canada’s big telcos be worried?”

The bottom line, as stated by SpaceX founder Elon Musk in the final paragraph, is “I want to be clear, it’s not like Starlink is some huge threat to telcos. I think it will be actually helpful and take a significant load off the traditional telcos”.

Unfortunately, you have to read through a full page and a half of muddled messages before reaching the answer to the question posed in the article’s headline.

Should Canada’s big telcos be worried? No, they shouldn’t. The end. Of course, that would have been too short an article to merit the front page of the Saturday business section.

Unfortunately, we were left without any explanation of Musk’s comment about how services like Starlink “will be actually helpful and take a significant load off the traditional telcos.”

The article featured a graphic indicating Canada’s average monthly price for broadband in 2020 ($77) was higher than other surveyed countries other than Australia ($78). The Star didn’t mention that the Australian government has squandered tens of billions of tax dollars on its National Broadband Network and yet, Australians still pay higher prices. The article, that reads somewhat like a Starlink advertorial piece, carries testimonials from customers seemingly happy to pay $700 up front and $130 per month for Starlink service – nearly double Canada’s average broadband price. At those prices, Starlink is clearly not a solution within the affordable reach for many Canadians.

Still, Starlink, and other low earth orbit (LEO) satellite broadband systems (unmentioned in the article), are important additions to the array of technologies available to bridge the rural and remote digital divide. LEO has the ability to provide service to locations that are beyond the economic reach of terrestrial wireless (both fixed and mobile), and can provide a more viable solution than wireline technologies in many low density locations.

It demonstrates why governments need to be technology agnostic when looking to accelerate broadband adoption in unserved areas. For example, I think it is a mistake for Ontario’s most recent broadband program to specify technologies for each service area, which may limit the ability for proponents to offer more cost-effective, and perhaps more rapidly deployed service options.

Rather than causing worry among major carriers, Starlink is much more likely to pose a threat to smaller rural wireless internet service providers, especially those providing lower bit-rate services, such as 5Mbps and lower. Further, each lost customer harms the financial viability for these small ISPs to upgrade their facilities. Business cases for providing service in rural and remote areas can be very fragile, and the loss of major clients can be devastating, as I wrote last year in “Anchor institutions”.

Last week, I noticed an interesting press release from New York Governor Kathy Hochul announcing a new billion dollar ‘ConnectAll’ initiative intending to bring affordable broadband to millions of NY residents.

The initiative calls for “over $1 billion in public and private investments to connect New Yorkers in rural and urban areas statewide to broadband”, but that part of the announcement appears to be more sizzle than steak, given a reliance on private sector funding “plus hundreds of millions of forthcoming dollars from the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act”.

Still, there are a few aspects to the announcement that are worth consideration by other jurisdictions, including all levels of government in Canada:

• $30-a-month Affordability Subsidy: To further the expansion of affordable broadband, the Department of Public Service will administer efforts to ensure every eligible New Yorker can take advantage of the IIJA’s $14 billion Affordability Program to support a permanent $30-a-month broadband subsidy for low-income households. The Department will also conduct a statewide marketing program geared toward increasing enrollment in this program — which currently lags below 30 percent of eligible households in New York.

…

• Removing Fees, Outdated Regulatory Hurdles and Leveraging State Assets. This includes a set of reforms not limited to:
  • A Build-Free Initiative for Rural Broadband Deployment – Eliminate state use and occupancy fees that hinder rural broadband deployment directing the Department of Transportation to exempt ConnectALL projects, reducing costs for program participants.
  • Streamline Make-Ready Processes: Direct the Department of Public Service (DPS) to streamline the current make-ready process.
  • Standardize Right-of-Way Access for Cellular and Fiber Deployments and Establish Clear Timelines: Establish clear permitting timelines for cellular and fiber deployments on state land and rights-of-way with simple and standardized forms and processes.
  • Leverage Existing State Fiber Assets: Conduct a pilot to leverage existing State fiber assets to support middle-mile broadband.

In August, I asked “Is there a better approach to affordable telecom service?” Right now, affordable internet programs in Canada are fully funded by the private sector. Would a different model be even more effective?

In addition, we need to examine government fees, and regulatory hurdles are inhibiting deployment of digital infrastructure in rural and remote areas. New York’s ConnectALL initiative has some promising proposals that should be considered by all public agencies and departments in municipal, provincial and federal governments.

Are there public sector assets that be leveraged for faster and more cost effective construction of communications facilities?

Should we rethink the CRTC’s broadband fund, perhaps examining a model that subsidizes service in high cost areas? Rather than subsidizing the upfront capital expenditures for extending networks to unserved areas (like every other government broadband program), should the CRTC fund assist with the ongoing higher operating expense?

The price of service from Starlink (and other satellite providers) are beyond the reach of many households, but such services may be the most economic way to service many Canadian households. Over the past couple years, we have frequently seen broadband funding announcements exceeding $10,000 in subsidies per household (as can be determined by reviewing ISED’s summary funding chart).

Can we be more creative in finding ways to build broadband better?

On December 17, the Government of Canada opened its consultation on the 3800 MHz spectrum band. The day before, Ceri Howes, Head of Regulatory for Opensignal published an article that I think merits highlighting, in light of the government’s stated object for the consultation “to ensure Canadians have access to high-quality wireless services.”

In the header for “Canada’s 5G future – the story so far”, Opensignal indicates the article “discusses some key considerations for Canada’s 5G future and highlights how policymakers and regulators can better make use of independent, globally-standardized data that reflects the actual experience of the consumers they serve.”

The article shows that Canada’s wireless carriers have consistently invested in new technologies, increasing spectrum efficiency and capacity, leading to Canada currently having some of the fastest 4G networks in the world, “despite Canada’s relatively low population density and the high capex and opex costs involved in deploying networks in rural and remote parts of a large country.”

However, the article observes that Canada is “unfortunately slipping behind” when it comes to 5G, and Opensignal suggests that spectrum policy is a factor.

The political and regulatory dynamics in Canada are complex, and spectrum management approaches also must consider factors such as a long, shared land border with the US. However, it is clear that various decisions around the timing, availability and pricing of critical 5G spectrum may be leading to constrained deployment.

Opensignal supported PWC Canada’s March 2021 report that looked at Canada’s connectivity needs in a post-COVID environment and looked at the implications for the roll-out of 5G. As I wrote at the time, the report identified six policy drivers to incentivize 5G deployment and broadband-enabled use cases, including spectrum timing and costs; network investment incentives; rural subsidies; and, funding for research and development.

Opensignal warns that Ottawa has a “pressing opportunity to prioritize the auction of additional mid-band and lower band spectrum”.

In Minister Champagne’s mandate letter, spectrum policy is only mentioned once: “Accelerate broadband delivery by implementing a ‘use it or lose it’ approach to require those that have purchased rights to build broadband to meet broadband access milestones or risk losing their spectrum rights.” I think much greater focus on spectrum policy is needed.

Opensignal says, “The speed with which new spectrum is allocated to carriers is also important if Canada is to see the full economic benefits of 5G and also if it is going to continue to rank highly on mobile network experience worldwide.”

As 2022 opens, 5G use cases in “agriculture, mining and manufacturing will play a central role in the transformation of Canada’s industrial policy and digital economy”.

Spectrum policy needs to take a higher profile on Canada’s political and economic agenda.

For the 3800 MHz consultation, comments are due February 15, with replies due March 7.