Bell seeks withdrawal of voice services due to competitor funding

BCE Inc. has filed a Part 1 application with the CRTC asking the commission to remove the obligation to offer voice service when a competitor has received broadband funding. The document, filed Nov. 4 but made public Monday, concerns the villages of Nairn and Fingal in southwest Ontario. North Frontenac Telephone Co. and Xplore Inc. have each received money from the provincial Accelerated High Speed Internet Program (AHSIP) to roll out broadband. Bell is the incumbent carrier in the region. Rogers Communications Inc. and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (Space X)’s Starlink also provide competitive service, although they are not listed as receiving government funding in the region. “It is neither efficient nor in the interest of consumers to continue to impose an obligation to serve over an increasingly end-of-life copper network when consumers can obtain more reliable service using the more modern (and government-subsidized) networks while also contributing to the continued expansion and operation of those networks,” the ILEC writes. “Public policy should encourage consumers to seek reliable service from modern high-speed networks and should not assume or incentivize continued reliance on outdated copper networks, which are more costly, less performant, increasingly unreliable, and inconsistent with the commission’s resiliency agenda.” Copper grids are more prone to outages, the company continues, resulting in environmental damage, failure of equipment, and copper theft. It says a 2024 theft in Preston, Ont., also in the southwest section of the province, affected over 1,000 lines for around 60 hours. Telecom manufacturers are no longer making some equipment, forcing telcos to turn to markets like eBay to find material. It says copper is not viable in a marketplace offering such high-speed products as fibre to the premises (FTTP), data over cable service inference specification (DOCSIS), fixed wireless access, and low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites. Bell points to the CRTC Broadband Fund, the federal government’s Universal Broadband Fund, Ontario’s AHSIP, and the Ontario regional fund Southwestern Integrated Fibre Technology (SWIFT), maintaining that they have altered the competitive landscape. “The fact that government subsidy programs support broadband internet–rather than voice services–demonstrates that voice services are increasingly unnecessary for Canadians, especially given the widespread availability of VoIP , which allows consumers to easily access voice services over the internet using an over-the-top platform,” the telecom states. Bell said it serves about 511 businesses and households in Nairn and 342 in the Fingal exchange. Parts of the 22-page application have been redacted to protect competitive market information. ppark@thewirereport.ca

Bell seeks withdrawal of voice services due to competitor funding

Regulatory |
By Paul Park
|November 11, 2025

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