On outages, Rogers exec calls for ‘regulatory humility’ at CRTC

MISSISSAUGA – When it comes to CRTC chair Ian Scott's Monday announcement of the regulator's upcoming proceeding on network outages, Rogers Communications Inc.’s chief regulatory officer Ted Woodhead said that the CRTC needed to demonstrate "regulatory humility." The executive spoke Tuesday at a “regulatory blockbuster” panel for 2022 Canadian Telecom Summit. Woodhead noted that ISED already had Canada’s largest providers sign a memorandum of understanding that established a communications protocol, mutual assistance agreements, and emergency roaming capabilities between providers in response to the Rogers July outage. He added that there was legislation in the works from the department which predated the incumbent’s national outage. “I think that actually is the kind of answer that makes sense here, and I'm not sure that the CRTC has to do anything other than, you know, its general oversight role,” Woodhead said. “People have convened and I think we'll get there within a matter of months.” Woodhead’s regulatory humility comments reflect comments he made earlier in the panel when asked to reflect on the CRTC’s performance during the last five years and what they hope to see next with a new commissioner on the way. “Perhaps people may reflect on a bit of regulatory humility,” Woodhead said. Woodhead said the last five years have been “rocky” but that, overall, the CRTC got many decisions right. Looking ahead the commission will need more resources, he said, as the government is planning to dump two new pieces of legislation onto the regulator. “I have observed this tremendous backlog of files at the commission that haven’t moved. We face all kinds of different issues, access issues, other issues, arbitration or resolution things that have not moved. And that's unfortunate,” he said. “And that in combination with C-11, C-18, and all of the work that presumably is going to entail is going to require significant resources.” Cogeco Inc. vice president of regulatory affairs Paul Beaudry weighed in on the CRTC’s outage proceeding, saying he would “caution against having a ready-shoot-set approach” where the regulator might implement “overly-stringent requirements that might impede network deployments” in a way that the industry can’t predict at this stage. Telus Corp. vice president of telecom policy and chief regulatory legal counsel Stephen Schmidt advocated some form of publication transparency around outages but ultimately agreed with Woodhead about regulatory humility. Ultimately though, Schmidt said it is up to companies to operate their networks. “We have to play the reliability game at the end of the day,” Schmidt said. The Competitive Network Operators of Canada executive director and general counsel Geoff White, said that the CRTC needs to examine what he said is the “broader” issue: “looking at monopoly-like status” of the telecom industry “but not regulating as though this is like a monopoly.” Iristel Inc. CEO Samer Bishay also said that there is no real incentive for Canada’s Big Three to properly deal with network outage issues because of the lack of competition. Bishay said if there was service-based competition then consumers would have had a choice during the outage “because if there was an MVNO at least that customer could roam on a different network and not be stuck with one network.” Earlier in the panel Bishay said that his main gripe with the CRTC over the past five years is course reversal on its decisions and, arguing that the commission needs to stay the course, whether its decisions are right or wrong. He also said there is a greater likelihood Canadian’s will see the country take home a FIFA World Cup before it sees any telecom reform. While BCE Inc. chief legal and regulatory officer Rob Malcolmson was billed as part of the regulatory panel, he did not appear. – Reporting by Jenna Cocullo at jcocullo@thewirereport.ca and editing by Michael Lee-Murphy at mleemurphy@thewirereport.ca

On outages, Rogers exec calls for ‘regulatory humility’ at CRTC

News | 11/23/2022 2:37 pm EST

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