Industry committee  If I could try that, I don't think Rogers will be in Sudbury. The only realistic facilities-based competitor in North Battleford, Saskatchewan, is Access Communications. We're the only other ones with the facilities and infrastructure that allow us to offer facilities-based comp

Industry committee  Those are in their licensed areas. What we're talking about is Persona's licensed areas, Access Communications' licensed areas, or Bluewater's licensed areas. I don't think existing cable operators are going to go in and over-wire those systems.

Industry committee  My first message would be that if you want competition, you should call your local member of Parliament so that we can get some sanity back into the process of rolling out a competitive environment.

Industry committee  Momma's been protecting these guys for 100 years. We're only asking Momma to protect us for a few months, until 25% is satisfied. Then let's take the gloves off.

Industry committee  Yes, we do; we do feel left alone.

Industry committee  You asked what it means to the consumers. In North Battleford, Saskatchewan, it means that the bottom line is that all bets are off. We won't be there until we know what's going on with respect to what's going to happen on the competitive landscape. Whereas I had said to consumer

Industry committee  You can't phone the phone company and ask for a discount in North Battleford, Weyburn, or Estevan because we won't be there, and that's not fair.

Industry committee  We certainly didn't expect this type of retroactive writing of the rules, no.

Industry committee  Anything is better than what we have now.

Industry committee  I'm not sure that it's a matter of a specific period of time. You characterized it right, that these are temporary. We're asking for some temporary protections. As we get to that threshold, which the commission had set at 25%, which we thought was a good number, and that's why we

Industry committee  Speaking for my company, we had a 24-month plan to roll out primary-line telephone service to the vast majority of our customers in Saskatchewan. In the next 24 months, 98% of our customer base would have access to primary-line telephone service, under the preceding regime, under

Industry committee  But isn't the third leg in the test the existence of a facilities-based provider? I mean, that happens day one. We launched telephone service in Regina two weeks ago. As of that moment, without one single customer, then we met the test. Then deregulation happens. Then the win-bac

Industry committee  In Regina, for example, the consumers are looking to buy telephone service. They don't want to differentiate by product or by type of service. A telephone is a telephone is a telephone. But they have certain expectations: that it works in the event of a power outage, and that the

Industry committee  You're asking us to take something on faith here that's going to come out of the Competition Bureau. I can tell you that we're not going to invest the millions of dollars required to launch telephone service in Kamsack or Weyburn, Saskatchewan, based on faith. We need a set of ru

Industry committee  Certainly. We've said that in the ten largest CMAs in the country, where competition is already vibrant, just do what you like. But in small markets where smaller players are getting under way, we believe the market test ought to stay the same; that the 25% threshold for forbeara