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Canada Courts Quash Gov't Decision On Globalive
sitkill writes "A Canadian Federal Court ruling has rejected the Tory Cabinet's decision to overturn a CRTC mandate not allowing Globalive (which is more commonly known in Canada as the mobile carrier Wind) to operate in Canada. This is a small vindication to the embattled CRTC, which has been recently in the spotlight for its decision on usage based billing, drawing criticism from the Tory Cabinet. The CEO, Mr. Lacavera, stressed that this would not result in Globalive's Wind Mobile being shut down, simply that it would require another round of wrangling with the regulator over how much foreign influence is acceptable in a Canadian telecommunications company."
One should *always* stick with a company based in one's own nation. I'll have to get on my T-Mobile phone and send the news to my buddies on Facebook right aw...
(I kid, I kid...)
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Can we please unscramble this? I lost count of the negatives. Can Globalive operate in Canada, or not?
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Xenophobic Canadians! Who woulda thunk it?
It's patently obvious to most Canadians that many of our government agencies collude with industry to screw citizens out of their hard earned dollars. From protectionism to anti-competitive regulation, it seems like virtually everyone we employ from city to federal government is cashing two paycheques.
Didn't really see this one coming though. Usually the courts exercise some amount of restraint enforcing bad law after bad law.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
Typical in this goddamned backward country. We should be thanking our lucky stars we have cell phone companies like Bell and Rogers to protect us from those evil American companies and their low prices.
I have nothing compelling to say
Quebec should stay, it's Ottawa that should separate.
Ok, so step by step... CRTC says 'Hey Wind Mobile, we don't want you operating in Canada'. Tories say 'That ain't right they should be able to operate in Canada'. Federal Court says 'Hey Tories, STFU Wind Mobile isn't doing business in Canada.' This is all quite confusing to me since I was under the impression that Wind was already operating in western Canada.
This decision is especially bad as Wind is one of the few companies that's actually offering competition against the big telcos and cable companies. They have low-priced data plans without long term contracts, and actually seem to want your business. It's too bad they don't cover more area. With this and the usage based billing decision it's becoming more and more obvious that the CRTC is bought and paid for by the existing 'big guys' in the industry.
... allow payment plans for them but no tying to long term contracts.
I've said it before: if I ran the country it would be illegal to have long term communication contracts as it hurts competitiveness. No bundling phones, etc
That's ridiculous. It's a condemnation of the Harper government's attempt to circumvent the foreign ownership laws on behalf of one particular company, without actually bothering to amend the law first.
The court has banned wind in Canada.
Sounds good to me living in the upper midwest. We could do with less wind coming from the north at this time of year.
(Note: this is based on my memory of reading the decision last night at 4 a.m., and I don't feel like rereading it for a /. comment; some things may be slightly off, and IANAL, but the gist is correct.)
Telecommunications companies in Canada cannot be "influenced" by non-Canadians, which means while non-Canadians can have a stake in a company, it can't be significant (there's no set standard, but think under 10% or 20% and not on the board). (Whether this policy is a good idea is fully debatable, but it's the law.)
Globalive (operating as Wind Mobile) is an upstart Canadian cell phone company run by Canadians (technically, they're old, but new to the cell market); there's no dispute here. However, to bid in the recent spectrum auction, it needed cash. So they called up Orascom, an Egyptian company, to get some financing. But they needed so much money that if they issued equity (shares) Orascom would own more than half of Globalive, breaking the Telecommunications Act. So they decided to borrow the money (debt) from them instead, thereby getting around the rules.
Public Mobile, another upstart Canadian company that also won spectrum in the auction, said this was unfair: they played by the rules and got financing from Canadians, and so took Globalive to the CRTC. The regulator ruled that while "in law" Globalive was certainly Canadian, "in fact" they owed so much money as a part of their overall net worth (~2/3) to Orascom there was no way the latter couldn't have influence on the former, which meant Globalive broke the rules and couldn't even bid in the spectrum auction, let alone operate in Canada.
The Conservative Government, which is generally pro-free market (in favour of foreign investment and competition and against regulators and government, though many have argued their actions haven't matched their ideals (see, e.g. Potash Corp., supply management, etc.)), issued a cabinet decision that overruled their regulator, thereby allowing Globalive to operate (which it did within days). They are allowed to overrule the CRTC, but they can't just say "because I said so": they need to justify their reasons, and the Federal Court can review their decision to see if their reasons are reasonable. (Obviously any decision will be debatable, so there is some standard for reasonableness.) So Public Mobile took the government to court. (For those interested in where our scummy telcos (Bell, Rogers, Telus) lined up, they all, of course, favoured less competition, so wanted to get Globalive out of business regardless of the merits of the case, though only Telus spoke at trial. We know they're hypocrites because their execs have all publicly lobbied for opening up telcos to foreign ownership and financing, while arguing against it here.)
The court ruled that the CRTC was correct in determining that Globalive was influenced by a non-Canadian, and that the government's "reasons" for their decision did not change this.
Basically, there are four basic tenets of telecommunications policy set out in the act, and one of them is the no non-Canadian influence part. The government tried to say that this part was less important than the other three parts, and that this part should only be applied "when possible" (i.e. when it won't conflict with the other parts). The government also seemingly added another tenet, which was that companies should search for technological advancement from outside Canada. And lastly, it said its cabinet decision applied only to Globalive, so wasn't precedent.
The court said while there would be nothing wrong with a policy that had some tenets be more important than others, or one that added other tenets, that's not what the law says, and unless Parliament (legislative branch) changes this, the Cabinet (executive branch) can't issue a decision that isn't grounded in law. The court also said the arbitrariness of the decision (applying only to Globalive) further proved their decision couldn't stand.
So that's where we are. The judge sta
and the judge will get a box with all channels for free and uncapped max speed internet.
Woo Hoo, another Legislative Branch vs Judicial Branch. This could take a while... As a Democracy you guys know what we mean, eh?
I'm a Wind customer: $40 / month, unlimited talk & text Canada & US wide, unlimited internet (possibly throttled after 5 gigs).
I looked at the decision and summarized it here: http://android.maow.net./ The errors in law were:
Cantel (Rogers Wireless) was owned in part by AT&T and BT (British Telecom) in the 1990's. I would be interested to know when this law cited by the judge came into effect.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
The obvious solution is for the government (assuming they are still in fact pro-competition and still support the idea of Wind Mobile operating in Canada) to pass a law removing the requirement that telcos be operated by Canadians.
Why did Globalive have to go half way around the world to get money in the first place? Because this country and its investment banking and VC community are a joke and nothing more than ex-bankers playing with a handful of land developer's money. The truth is that any decent company from any field (tech/biotech or other) will abandan/sell-out Canada eventually because our own country lacks the fundamental principles of investing in itself.
rejected x to overturn y not allowing z. In the end this requires quite a bit of thought WHAT was the result. That's why I always teach "Use variables and functions with positive logic, so you always use "isCorrect", not " !isFaulty" because very soon it devolves into unmaintainable mess.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Thinking of starting a pressure group National Ringer Association with the aim of supporting sensible mobile pricing, no contract lock-ins, no data caps etc.
The rallying cry directed at the CRTC and voiced by a passionate Canadian celebrity would be:
'You can have our wind mobiles when you can prize them from our cold dead hands!'
In closing may I add that if it was not for the greedy governments running practically fixed auctions for spectrum that results in massive bids, then Wind would not have been forced to go outside Canada to find the extra funding. There was a time when all spectrum was licensed for an agreed fee that only depended upon factors affecting the support of that licensing.
Disclaimer: The above in no way should be confused with the National Rifle Association or its aims, it is recognised by the author that a strong society can only proceed upon the premiss that ownership and use of lethal weapons of all kinds must be closely controlled by sensible laws, and that includes your Hummer Mr. I'm going to occupy two lanes of the 401 at a time.
donot think that petition would mean squat to a majorly owned company outside canada
anyone who does is a shill for foreigners
For a long time, Canada has been ass backwards over how it allows cable and phone companies to operate. When cell phone companies wanted to charge BOTH ways for text messages, members of parliament debated allowing more companies into the country. That got stomped out RIGHT quick. Don't kid yourself, the government is NOT in charge of this country.
Defender of Microsoft and Communism!!!
Looks like Bell Wins another round, as their puppet (the CRTC) gets to block off another competitor from entering into Canada!
After all, we can't have anyone compete with Ma Bell, or Regulate them into fair market pricing, or anything...
The issue is not competition or even wireless-related at all. There is a Federal Law specifying some minimum requirements. The cabinet decided that we will give a one-time exception to a particular private company, and allow them to break the law. A federal judge said: no, cabinet cannot do that, if they want to make exceptions in law, they have to do it the proper way: pass a bill, through parliament. I think this is a great decision since this gives more power to the democratically elected parliament, as opposed to a chosen Cabinet. (If the ruling party controls only 30% of the votes, they shouldn't have carte blanche to do anything they want, esp. breaking laws)
I am torn about this issue. While the Canadian in me doesn't want to see foreign companies own a majority in a Canadian telecom, the consumer in me is really upset about how much cell service costs in this country (i.e. *way* more expensive than most other countries). Bell and Rogers charge for incoming SMS if you don't have SMS in your plan, and it seems that they work with each other to fix prices. Not only does Canadian consumers need competition for these folks, this competition needs deep pockets in order to successfully compete with these folks, which Wind has, thanks to its parent Orascom. So I am torn. It doesn't help, either, that Orascom also in a joint partner in Koryolink, North Korea's only 3G Mobile operator.
Yet one of the other major carriers is "Bell Canada", which I'm fairly sure still has some fairly strong attachment to their US megacorp counterpart. So what gives there?
This glob... it's... it's alive!
Or is it meant to be Glob-a-live? Either way it's a puzzling moniker.
The CEO was a dorm mate of mine from college. Go to the new issue of the University of St. Michael's College alumni magazine for an article on him.
If the court follows the letter of the law and not the spirit of the law, there's something wrong. The spirit of the law has to do with protecting the Canadian Consumer. The spirit of the law has less to do with protecting the existing old boys' market share.
Taken from the article: "Globalive, which is backed financially by Egyptian communications giant Orascom Telecom, was denied a licence in 2009 to operate by
the federal telecommunications regulator(CRTC) on the grounds that it did not meet Canadian ownership requirements for phone companies. "
I believe the Canadian citizens don't benefit from the increased competition when CRTC puts sticks in Globalive/Wind Mobile's wheels.
Again taken from the article: "Weeks later, the Harper government vetoed that decision, permitting Globalive to launch under the Wind Mobile brand. In about 14 months of operation, it has acquired more than 200,000 customers. "
I believe the Harper government did the right thing when they gave Globalive/Wind Mobile the green light to go ahead. Hats off.
I believe the Federal Court’s move to overturn this decision recently seems to confirm the fact that CRTC and the Federal Court don't represent the Canadian Citizens interest at heart. I also believe the CRTC and the Federal Court are being overtly protective and keeping the lion's share of the telco/isp/mobile market for the existing old boys' club.
I also feel the CRTC should be ashamed with the recent performance record in failing to protect Canadian consumers against rising INTERNET/TELCO costs. I'm disappointed with the Federal Court siding with the CRTC decisions. Perhaps others might agree with me that it would be in Canada's best interests to dissolve the CRTC considering all the recent data with respect to usage-based billing and thwarting off foreign competitors. Both of these actions certainly don't prevent telco/isp/mobile fees from rising through the roof.
China's consumers pay 80RMB(13$CAN)/month for GB 3G mobile 2GB(Usage-Based Billing) usage. 13$CAN may seem inexpensive it but is because you reach that cap easily before the end of one week if you use google maps with satellite view turned on. It's still very expensive. This proves UBB doesn't work elsewhere.
China's consumers pay 166.67RMB(27.78$CA)/month for domestic internet ADSL unlimited usage 6Mbps download/1Mbps upload. It's excellent service and the price is much more competitive than in Canada. The average Chinese netizen is increasingly interested in QQ, baidu, sina, youku, blogs, p2p, and net games. All of which would be grounded to a halt if it weren't for China's wise flatrate/uncapped usage internet billing policy. It works well for everyone in general.
In Canada, we need more competition. In Canada, we need lower uncapped flatrate telco/internet/mobile rates not only to keep the Canadian tech community strong, but also to encourage more worldwide collaborative synergy, world interdependence, and ultimately world peace. Recent throttling/cutting of internet across borders certainly doesn't help us to get there either.
Don't forget the smartphone!
Once we sign up, we never get an email reply so we can join in. Are you folks a scam or what?
The CRTC wanted to FORCE a 25 gig cap on broadband users. When the idea came under fire they "postponed" it for 2 months to avoid criticism. We should continue campaigning against it regardless because they intend to do it once we turn our backs and schedule it so it doesn't affect the next federal election.
There is no good reason for the decision to implement such a cap which makes the scary possibilities even more poignant.
Keep up to date on freedom of speech rallies in Canada and remember to vote for a party that supports net-neutrality!