Thank you very much.
I'm Pamela Miller, director general of the telecommunications policy branch at Industry Canada, and with me is my colleague, Allan MacGillivray. Division 41 would amend the Telecommunications Act to make two separate sets of changes. First, the amendments in clause 595 would implement the changes to telecom foreign investment restrictions that were announced by the Minister of Industry on March 14. They will allow telecom carriers with less than 10% of total annual revenues from the provision of telecom services to operate in Canada without being subject to the Canadian ownership and control requirements. These changes will help telecom companies with a small market share to access the capital they need to grow and compete. Carriers that are so qualified would be able to continue to operate if they grow organically past the 10% threshold, provided that the increase beyond 10% did not result in the acquisition of another carrier or of assets used by another carrier to provide telecom services.
The second set of amendments pertains to the enforcement functions for the “do not call” list. The changes in clauses 596 to 601 would permit the Canadian Radio Television and Telecommunications Commission, the CRTC, to impose fees on telemarketers to support the CRTC's cost of enforcing the “do not call” list and other telemarketing rules made under the telecom act. These amendments would also allow the CRTC to delegate responsibility for collection of these fees to a third party. By these actions, the cost of the enforcement and investigation shifts from the CRF to the telemarketing industry, thereby saving money.
In brief, those are the two sets of changes that are being made through these amendments.