February 2011 Archives

When the CRTC proposed the “easing” of a ban on false and misleading news, the public firestorm was immense.

The story was perplexing. Here was a little-known committee of Parliament, the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations, poking around with the delicate wording of a regulation upheld by the CRTC. According to the Standing Joint Committee, the wording of the regulation that prohibits the broadcasting of “false or misleading news” in Canada “contravenes the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”

Continue Reading...

Francoise Bertrand, former chairwoman of the CRTC, is speaking out after Canada’s Conservatives demanded a reversal of the regulatory agency’s decision regarding usage-based billing.

Betrand told The Canadian Press that she found the reversal “disturbing.” She says she’s an advocate of the “independence” of the CRTC and, as such, felt “compelled to speak out.”

“The CRTC’s great advantage was it was giving the possibility for the government to have an institution at arm’s length,” she said. ”It was not a political decision.

Continue Reading...