Canadian Heritage committee  In terms of advanced infrastructure, including 5G, about half the telecommunications section of the report is devoted to figuring out how to accelerate the rollout of advanced infrastructure, including 5G. We have a number of recommendations around the ways in which that infrastructure is different from traditional infrastructure and how we can, through legislative reform, accelerate that deployment, as well as make sure it is done in a safe and secure environment.

Canadian Heritage committee  Well, let me start by saying, first of all, that we really embrace the notion of an open global market. We recognize that people are getting content, including news content, from anywhere, any time, on any device they would like. The role of the CRTC is no longer one of gatekeeping, so if there are services in other languages that are available to people, they can get those online in a way that may not not have been the case earlier, when you had to have a licence to offer anything to somebody in Canada.

Canadian Heritage committee  It's yours.

Canadian Heritage committee  I'll start, and then my colleague will pick up. She's worked in the production industry for many years. The main distinction we were trying to draw was between service productions and productions that count as contributing to Canadian culture. Service productions are great in the sense that jobs are created, there is employment, there is production capacity, and it's great for the Canadian economy.

Canadian Heritage committee  For the curators like Netflix, the idea was instead of asking them to be taxed and put money into a fund that would then be distributed, they're investing in Canada. All we're saying is, when you make those spending investments that right now are service productions, some portion of that spending should meet the Canadian content requirements so we're not then interfering with their business models, the categories of programming they make, what genres of programming they consider.

Canadian Heritage committee  Well, you covered a lot of ground in that question, so—

Canadian Heritage committee  —let me try to unpack it a little bit. It's interesting because, as you know, Telus is one of the only big players that doesn't have a content business, so I'm not sure how.... The conflict of interest is one that I really don't feel. When you look at the returns for Bell versus CTV, it's more that the money flows from Bell.

Canadian Heritage committee  That was in the 1980s.

Canadian Heritage committee  However, that doesn't exclude people from different parts of the country. It just says that it's very hard for the CRTC with commissioners based in the region to really build relationships of trust and collaboration. It does not exclude people based on their geography.

Canadian Heritage committee  There is no question that it's important to ensure a broad geographic representation at the CRTC, through the way that commissioners are chosen, as well as through the public interest committee, where those members would be able to be resident in whatever region they are from. On balance, from the representations we heard and our consultations, we felt that the quality and effectiveness of CRTC decision-making would be enhanced if members were resident in the national capital region.

Canadian Heritage committee  The size and composition of the CRTC?

Canadian Heritage committee  Absolutely.

Canadian Heritage committee  Absolutely.

Canadian Heritage committee  The recommendation around the commission?

Canadian Heritage committee  We didn't really get into the definitions of what is urban versus rural versus remote. What we focused on in the telecom section was making sure that every Canadian, no matter where they live in Canada, has broadband connectivity. It really was a question of who doesn't have broadband connectivity and how fast we can close that gap.