Search Results for: affordable

Connecting Canadians was the name of a $305M federal government program in 2014 that promised to “provide 98 percent of Canadian households in rural and remote regions of Canada with greater access to broadband Internet”.

At the time, Industry Minister James Moore said:

As we move toward Canada’s 150th birthday in 2017, our government is proud to launch a new program that will connect 280,000 Canadian households to high-speed Internet. Connecting Canadians is about ensuring that Canadians, whether they live in urban centres or remote regions of the country, have access to the latest wireless technologies and high-speed networks at the most affordable prices possible.

Despite this bold statement, there really was nothing in the “new program” that did anything to ensure Canadians in urban centres would “have access to the latest wireless technologies and high-speed networks at the most affordable prices possible.”

Like federal and provincial government programs that preceded Connecting Canadians and those that have followed it, funding has been provided to extend networks to rural and remote areas. This is an important role for the federal government, but it is not enough to achieve the objective of ensuring that all Canadians have affordable access to the latest wireless technologies and high-speed networks.

Greg O’Brien wrote an important commentary yesterday on CARTT.ca, “$200 million for 5G. Still zero million for those who can’t afford any G.”

How many don’t have milk in their fridge – or don’t have a fridge, let alone a smart one? How many people who live in Canadian cities and don’t worry about parking their self-driving cars because they can’t afford one – and who will never read the news about 5G – or much of any news – because they can’t afford internet access?

And then that made us wonder why three different governments can each find $67 million to help fund something that doesn’t really need additional public help – but none of them can figure out a way to build a program to get broadband access and devices to those who can’t afford them.

I have been writing about this theme for much too long, as I describe in “An affordable broadband strategy.”

For a decade, I have suggested that an affordable broadband strategy may need more in the way of government leadership and not as much in the way of funding. We need more research to better understand the digital divide. That may merit creating and coordinating a broadband research agenda to better understand the factors that are keeping 1 in 6 Canadian households from subscribing to a broadband connection.

As I wrote last year, the March 2017 Federal budget held out promise that the government was finally starting to look at “who” needed broadband assistance, not just “where”. A year later, we have not yet seen the outcome that work.

The WEF suggests “encouraging experimentation with flexible approaches and removing regulatory or other obstacles may be an effective way forward, in addition to revising tax policies and providing direct subsidies.”

Over the past 2 years, some ‘obstacles’ have been imposed in Canada that could conflict with an environment that should encourage such experimentation, as described in “Connecting the unconnected.” for example, the World Economic Forum writes “Some have questioned zero-rated services on the belief that such services run counter to net neutrality. Others point out that some access is better than no access at all, even if users cannot choose which apps and services are ‘free’.”

Are regulatory decisions being guided by clear and transparent policy directions?

The Executive Summary of the report from The National Broadband Task Force (established in January 2001) stated “The principal mandate of the Task Force was to map out a strategy for achieving the Government of Canada’s goal of ensuring that broadband services are available to businesses and residents in every Canadian community by 2004.” The report holds up well considering it was completed more than a decade and a half ago.

I have written before that Canada is long overdue for a review of digital policy matters. Recall that the Telecom Policy Review panel called for a fresh look every 5 years. The report from the Telecom Policy Review Panel was released 5 years after the report from the National Broadband Task Force. That was 2006.

In the recent budget, I didn’t notice funding for a review panel.

Earlier this week, Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains observed “Technology is changing the way we live, work and engage with one another, and we are in a global innovation race. To prepare for the future, we must be bold, visionary and decisive.”

We also need to be inclusive. One in six Canadian households still don’t have a connected computer.

To win the ‘global innovation race’ we need to ensure that all Canadians have an opportunity to participate.

An interesting new report examining the “Digital Divide in the U.S.” [pdf, 4.1MB] was released late last week by the Purdue Center for Regional Development.

The report found:

• Job and establishment growth between 2010 and 2015 was substantially lower in counties with the highest digital divide
• Digital economy industries and associated jobs increased overall across all areas, including counties with the highest digital divide
• Digital economy establishments — of which 57 percent were nonemployers — increased in the nation and across all digital divide categories. In fact, the largest percent change in digital economy establishments between 2010 and 2015 took place in counties with the highest digital divide

It was this last unexpected finding that caught my eye since it seems counter-intuitive: the greatest increase in digital economy establishments took place in counties with the greatest digital divide. The report observed that most of these “digital economy establishments” had no employees, “the majority of digital economy establishments are entrepreneurs.”

These local entrepreneurs may be strategically leveraging digital platforms for their businesses minimizing costs, increasing efficiency, and reaching new markets. This apparently allows them to “break free” of the otherwise limited labor force and market in their more than likely small communities.

The report also observed that the digital divide is not just a divide between rural and urban areas. “The digital divide is between those that have access, can afford, and apply knowledge to leverage the technology to improve their quality of life versus those that do not have access, cannot afford, or lack knowledge.”

So far, Canada has focused government programs on the geographic digital divide, without federal programs to deal with socio-economic factors that limit digital adoption in urban centres. In January, I wrote “An affordable broadband strategy“, asking if Canada should establish its own Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee to help guide a holistic approach to increase broadband adoption in urban and rural households.

Through the years, I have suggested the need for more research, such as “Do we know what we don’t know?” and “Building a broadband research agenda.” The Purdue report observes that understanding and measuring a problem is a crucial first step for public policy makers before we discuss potential solutions. The development of a Digital Divide Index, such as that described in its report, provides an interesting approach.

As the Purdue report concludes, “A coordinated, robust effort should be made to improve broadband infrastructure throughout the country that are on the wrong side of the divide while at the same time increasing digital literacy and know-how among residents, elected officials, and businesses.”

Bridging the digital divide isn’t just about rural infrastructure. Should Canada expand research to improve our understanding of other contributing factors that limit digital adoption?

“The Government will encourage more private sector competition and investment in services that have become essential in a digital economy.” That is a quote from the letter of welcome sent to CRTC Chair Ian Scott last week by Heritage Minister Melanie Joly and Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Navdeep Bains.

“All Canadians and Canadian businesses deserve high quality telecommunications services at affordable prices.” How do you increase competition to drive “affordable” service prices while simultaneously encouraging investment?

It is a delicate balance. How do we define and measure “affordable”? We all want lower prices for everything, other than our own wages, but when you add the modifier “high quality” to the product definition, it gets more difficult to implement.

What is the right way to increase competition? What is the right level of competition that provides pricing discipline, encourages innovation, and maintains the right incentives for continued investment in infrastructure?

A recent article by Rita Trichur in the Globe and Mail starts by saying

The three-year contract is dead, but monthly bills keep rising. Switching carriers is a nightmare, add-on charges multiply like cockroaches, and being off contract doesn’t guarantee that you’ll find a substantially better deal if you shop around.

Many blame the CRTC. The regulator has tinkered with the rules, but it has largely failed to keep major carriers in check.

Yes. Monthly bills went up precisely because the three year contract is dead, just as the CRTC was warned. The CRTC banning innovative pricing plans like zero rating also has led to less price competition and discouraging product differentiation. In the case of Videotron’s Unlimited Music, the CRTC prohibited a service innovation by a new entrant and denied consumers a chance to save.

On one hand, we want consumers to have more choice, on the other hand certain groups want the only competition to be on the basis of price. If a service provider doesn’t have market power, do we really need to regulate its services and products?

Two sides to every coin.

The issue of spectrum set asides is another one that is more complicated than the average soundbite portrays. On one hand, the new entrants want access to more spectrum in the lower frequency bands, as noted by Christine Dobby in her recent article, which is why they are seeking a set-aside in the 600 MHz auction. On the other hand, Canada’s new entrants in the mobile wireless sector are not start-ups; they are multi-billion dollar vertically integrated communications giants – Shaw and Quebecor.

Quebecor’s Videotron Ltd. now has 16 per cent of wireless subscribers in the province and, after wrapping up expensive investments in building an LTE network, the business now makes a healthy contribution to the telecom division’s free cash flow, which increased by almost $100-million in the first half of this year to $399.5-million.

While Quebecor CEO Pierre Karl Péladeau told The Globe and Mail that Rogers, Bell and TELUS “received swaths of low-band spectrum from the government at no charge when they first set up their cellular networks in the 1980s”, the other side of that issue is that the incumbents have been paying annual license fees for that “free” spectrum. In total, the three companies have paid more than three and a half billion dollars in license fees, with a present value of more than $8.5B in 2017 dollars. This is hardly swaths of spectrum for “no charge”.

Under such considerations, should we still have spectrum set-aside for “new entrants” in the upcoming auction? Is it noteworthy that just last week, Mr. Péladeau criticized a two-tier system for Canadian content obligations, saying it “is blatantly unjust.”

Two sides to every coin.

High quality services at affordable prices creates a difficult tension in implementing communications policy.

What is affordable for some is different than what is considered affordable for others. As I have written before, perhaps our focus should be looking at the issue of affordability by “Looking at who, not just where.”

That would require increased product and service flexibility and the ability for service providers to differentiate themselves. Do we really expect increased competition to emerge from heavy handed government regulation?

Today marks the beginning of another school year. Across Canada, millions of kids are preparing to meet new teachers, telling stories about what this did this past summer.

Many are wearing new outfits and are carrying new backpacks filled with the supplies they bought at “back-to-school” sales over the past couple of weeks. Some basic school supplies haven’t changed for generations. Do kids still buy protractors and compasses along with their pencils, pens and loose-leaf paper?

Cutting and pasting weren’t always done digitally. Are we past the days of collecting old magazines to carefully cut out pictures and paste them into school projects? I wonder if kids in today’s elementary school generation know where the computer terms “cut” and “paste” come from.

Incidentally, Duo-Tang, the original manufacturer of the report cover of choice for generations, was bought out nearly 15 years ago. Sure, those Duo-Tangs were theoretically reusable, but who among us didn’t want to submit our projects with a brand new cover? Each of us had our own style for folding the tangs. Who folded the tangs together? Who split them? Anyone alternate the direction of the three sets of tangs? Kids: if you don’t know what I am talking about, ask your parents.

Most Canadian school-aged kids have a computer at home to connect with their friends and their teachers, using online tools to get their assignments and submit them for assessment and evaluation. What about students who still don’t have a computer at home, let alone a broadband connection? How are they able to keep up with their schoolmates? It isn’t enough for them to have access to computers in public libraries and in a room at school; kids do homework at home. How can we expect them to succeed in today’s digitally enhanced education system?

TELUS [Internet for Good] and Rogers [Connected for Success] have bold corporate initiatives to target certain households in their wireline operating territories with affordable broadband programs. But despite these great programs, there are hundreds of thousands of homes outside their areas. To date, no cable company or phone company has stepped up with a targeted affordable broadband product for residents of Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Quebec, Nova Scotia, or PEI. Government programs have typically subsidized the supply of broadband based on geography, without looking at stimulating demand with subsidies looking at financial means.

Another school year is underway. Another opportunity for a fresh look.

Watch out for kids as you drive to work. When you get to the office, whether it is government or private sector, see how you can help get connected computers into every household with school-aged kids.

This week, kids across Canada will say goodbye to teachers for their summer break from school. No more pencils, no more books…

For too many kids, pencils and books continue to be the basic tools for completing homework, which seems somewhat anachronistic in a country promoting a national innovation agenda. Too many Canadian households don’t have a computer, let a lone a broadband connection.

I know that the first “Back to School” promotions are still about a month away, but I continue to be troubled by the number of school kids who won’t have access to the digital tool set they need to do homework when they return to classrooms in the fall.

In BC and Alberta, TELUS offers its Internet for Good service; in Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland & Labrador, Rogers offers Connect for Success. Both programs provide qualified disadvantaged households with access to broadband service for $10 per month and both service providers help get a low cost computer and training resources for the household. As Innovation, Science and Economic Development (ISED) Minister Bains acknowledged in his remarks at The Canadian Telecom Summit three weeks ago, TELUS and Rogers deserve recognition for launching these initiatives over the past couple years. These were private sector ventures, launched without government prodding, because management at the companies agreed it was the right thing to do.

But what about Saskatchewan? Manitoba? Quebec? Nova Scotia? PEI? Hundreds of thousands of households in those five provinces have physical access to broadband available, but aren’t able to get online. Indeed, according to the CRTC, these provinces have the lowest rates of broadband adoption in Canada.

Try to imagine how a kid can do homework today without a connected computer at home. I have said it too many times: Affordable broadband isn’t just a rural issue. How can we continue to ignore the households in our urban centres while the CRTC effectively duplicates ISED funding programs for rural broadband expansion? Where is the leadership?

Before the summer is out, will at least one service provider in each province take on the challenge – the responsibility – of helping to bring connected computers into the home of every school kid?