Industry committee  The way to think about this is that you have competition between the networks. Where you have competition between the networks, the effective market share is 50%. Two networks, 50%. So those numbers are irrelevant.

Industry committee  That's the problem with the 25%. The CRTC either explicitly or implicitly agreed with the CCTA in the sense that they were worried about predation. They asked how they could deal with this problem and said they could deal with it by forbearance. They said they would slow it down or they would make it very unlikely.

Industry committee  The figures aren't available. This is one of the frustrating aspects about dealing with the CRTC. The bureau tries to get this data through interrogatory and the answer comes back that it's confidential or not relevant. The confidential data is supplied to the CRTC, but the CRTC doesn't necessarily have the expertise to know what to do with it.

Industry committee  To go very quickly back to that, this isn't a question for the government, but in a newspaper in Calgary this week, some outfit called Netcaster, which unfortunately is owned by Bell, was offering satellite broadband Internet service across the whole province.

Industry committee  For $100 a month.

Industry committee  That doesn't sound cruel and brutal.

Industry committee  There are two responses to that. One is on this victim thing that you keep talking about. I disagree with that. It doesn't get rid of the assets, so there's no sense in the ILEC making the investment in predation if it doesn't actually drive the assets out of the business. It may drive mom and pop A out, but then mom and pop B can acquire the assets for a dollar and still compete.

Industry committee  And they will get a nice retirement cheque.

Industry committee  There are two issues. The first is deciding when we can forbear. The test that's been proposed by the minister and the Competition Bureau is if there is existing competition, then we can let markets take place. You're asking whether there is a reason for the government to be involved in regions where there is no competition and no broadband access.

Industry committee  Our framework is different. We were early out of the gate in terms of trying to introduce competition into the local network with the United States. The United States did it with their telecom act in 1996. We were engaged in the proceedings for establishing what the conditions of local competition were going to be.

Industry committee  The important thing about what the CRTC did, and about what is in the minister's order, is that we still have this latent regulation. We still have a price ceiling on basic residential service. So I think that's really important, because it means if you've made a mistake on geographic market definition and there's some area where you've forborne and there's no competition, they still have, in essence, regulation.

Industry committee  I don't think they would be immediately crushed, because the same incentives that the ILECs have when they compete against Shaw and Rogers affect them when they compete against the mom and pop operations. They're going to say, “Even if I crush them, unless the Competition Bureau lets me buy them out so I can acquire those assets, those assets will still be there.

Industry committee  So you're suggesting to me that Shaw is not willing to proceed if the minister's order is the regulatory framework?

Industry committee  I think you have to be careful.... We're under tight time constraints here in terms of what I'm allowed to say. In fact, there are a number of reasons why predation might not be such a concern in terms of being able to raise your price later. The most important one is that the cable networks are there.

Industry committee  Okay. I understand. I think that's fine. And that's why I think a very important bridge was crossed here by the ILECs. Traditionally, the ILECs claimed if we remove the regulatory barriers to entry, we could rely on the threat of hit-and-run entry to control market power and you could deregulate.