"Partnerships"
August 15-18, 1997 Halifax, Nova Scotia
Note especially recommendation's 4.11 and 4.22 (GG)
Information Highway Advisory Council (IHAC)
Author - Industry Canada
IHAC
ACCESS STEERING COMMITTEE
SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Policy Issue
"In an environment that will see local monopolies replaced by
competition, and in the context of ongoing work to develop a national
access strategy, what measures are needed by governments and the
private sector to ensure affordability and equity in Canadians' access
to essential services?"
Background Study
Access to the Internet: A Community Based Approach, Nordicity Group
Ltd. (Sandi McDonald).
Steering Committee Members
Francis Fox (Chair)
David Sutherland (Co-Chair)
Neil Baker
John MacDonald
Colin Watson
Elizabeth Hoffman
Janet Yale
Kenneth Engelhart
Sheridan Scott
Jim Savary
Andrew Reddick
Government Officials
Richard Simpson, IHAC Secretariat
Peter Ferguson, IHAC Secretariat
Monique Lajeunesse, IHAC Secretariat
John Sifton, IHAC Secretariat
Prabir Neogi, Industry Canada
David Niece, Canadian Heritage
ACCESS STEERING COMMITTEE
SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
[At its meeting on April 3-4, 1997, the Information Highway Advisory
Council approved the following conclusions and recommendations flowing
from the work of the Steering Committee on Access.]
Access to the Information Highway is critical to Canada's future as an
information society and its success as a knowledge economy. In
Building the Information Society, the federal government indicated its
intention to develop a national access strategy, reflecting the four
access principles enunciated in IHAC's first report, Connection,
Community, Content. The Council urges the government to meet its
commitment to articulate such a strategy before the end of 1997 (Rec.
4.1).
As the Information Highway has become more pervasive and significant
in the economic, social and cultural life of Canadians, the scope and
complexity of the access issue has increased. In consequence, an
effective strategy dealing with access to the Information Highway must
address at least three areas of public policy concern - (i) ensuring
access to basic telecommunications and broadcasting, which represent
Canadians' "on-ramps" to the Information Highway; (ii) promoting
access to new networks and services that are appearing on the
Information Highway, especially the Internet; and (iii) establishing a
formal mechanism for defining access in a knowledge society. The
Council believes the government must set forth clear directions and
take appropriate action in all three of these areas. Consistent with
its mandate to review progress, as well as to advise the government on
access, the Council has concluded that much has been accomplished in
this regard, but a great deal of work still needs to be done.
Access to Basic Network Services
In relation to basic network services in telecommunications and
broadcasting, Canadians have achieved one of the highest levels of
universality in the world. International data on penetration rates for
telephones, broadcast services and cable television show Canada at or
near the top in all three areas.
In the broadcasting area, the Council praises the Canadian
Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) release in
March 1997 of a policy framework for fair competition in broadcast
distribution services and urges the Commission to meet its deadline of
early 1998 for the promulgation of regulations.
In telecommunications, the Council expresses satisfaction with CRTC
decisions and planned proceedings intended to sustain universal access
at affordable rates. The Council urges the CRTC to act quickly, and
with appropriate attention to detail, on its expressed determination
to monitor closely trends in telephone penetration rates and
affordability indicators and to intervene when and if the principle of
universality is threatened (Rec. 4.2.).
Access to the Information Highway
In the Council's view, the government should emphasize access to the
Internet as a first step in ensuring equitable participation in a
knowledge society. Any policies assessing access to the Information
Highway must address access to the Internet (Rec. 4.3). Though unable
to determine whether access to the Internet will be a problem, the
Council calls on the federal government or the CRTC to monitor such
access, focusing on people in remote areas and people with low incomes
and disabilities. Statistics Canada should also develop ways to
measure such access and collect and publish the statistics (Rec. 4.4).
Because effective access to content largely depends on speed of
access, the government, in cooperation with industry, CANARIE and
public interest groups, should monitor deployment of high-speed
Internet access and the arrival of more video-based services on the
World Wide Web (Rec. 4.5).
A key concern of the Council is the promotion of public access to the
Internet. In the case of rural and remote areas, the Council
recommends: that the government and the CRTC work with industry to
develop the means to make Internet access available without
long-distance charges (Rec. 4.6); and that the government in
cooperation with industry proceed with the Advanced Satcom Initiative,
with a view to encouraging satellite provision of Internet access to
schools, libraries, community centres and other local institutions
(Rec. 4.7). The Council welcomes the decision in the February 1997
Budget to put an additional $30 million into an expansion of the
Community Access Program (CAP), and underscores the importance of the
goal of establishing public access sites by the year 2000 in the 5,000
rural and remote communities with populations between 400 and 50,000
(Rec. 4.8). Given the key question of how to sustain these sites in
the long term, the government should attach priority to providing the
resources sufficient both to install and sustain community access
points in locations to which the general public has easy access (Rec.
4.9). Since the majority of people with low incomes live in cities and
can be reached without exorbitant cost, the Council recommends that
CAP receive additional resources to extend community access sites on a
sustainable basis to urban neighbourhoods lacking such sites (Rec.
4.10).
The Council believes the existence of inclusive electronic public
spaces is vital to the democratic health of the emerging knowledge
society. Thus, the Council calls on governments to work closely with
industry and public interest and consumer groups to make community
networks and public spaces sustainable on the Information Highway
(Rec. 4.11), and recommends that the federal government develop
policies and procedures to contribute financially to non-profit
Internet access providers for the electronic provision of government
services and information to the general public (Rec. 4.12). While
urging government to move to electronic provision of services and
information, the Council emphasizes the continuing need for government
to provide information and services in traditional forms to citizens
without access to the Internet or public access sites (Rec. 4.13).
In the Council's view, digital literacy is a key precondition for
access to the Information Highway and success in the emerging
knowledge society. To this end and in keeping with the present
SchoolNet target of ensuring every school in Canada has full Internet
access by the end of 1998, the Council calls on all governments, the
educational community and the private sector to work together to meet
this goal (Rec. 4.14). The Council also urges governments to encourage
development of high-quality on-line tutorial and community-based
instruction available via public access sites, community networks and
the Internet (Rec. 4.15), and to provide resources to every publicly
funded library to support sustainable public access sites and learning
of basic computer and Internet skills by people who would not
otherwise be served (Rec. 4.16).
In September 1995, IHAC stated that Canadian content should have a
prominent place and "eye-level... shelf-space" on the Information
Highway. While noting progress in this respect, the Council recommends
that Canadian Internet access providers be encouraged to place
Canadian reference points on their home pages (Rec. 4.17), and that
the federal government resource existing programs, and develop
partnership strategies with others, to develop more Canadian content,
particularly in new media services (Rec. 4.18). The Council also notes
the relative lack of French-language content on the Internet and calls
on governments to work closely with industry, and in cooperation with
Francophone communities, to develop a critical mass of French-language
content and services for the Internet (Rec. 4.19).
Without availability of various alternative methods of access, the
Internet can be inaccessible to people with disabilities. Universal
design allows for this variety in methods of access. The Council
recommends that the government carefully monitor Internet developments
in this respect (Rec. 4.20); and fund an award program to honour
achievements in design of assistive devices and in application of
universal design principles in communications products, systems and
services (Rec. 4.21).
Defining Access in a Knowledge Society
The Council believes the fundamental social and economic
transformations attendant upon Canada's transition from an industrial
to a knowledge society constitute a strong argument for bringing to
bear in a focussed way on the access issue viewpoints beyond those of
the federal government and the usual participants in the CRTC
regulatory process. Decisions on what Information Highway services
should be considered essential will have far-reaching ramifications
and should be informed by the viewpoints of industry and the community
at large in all its diversity. The Council, while reluctant to create
another advisory body, believes on balance the issue is so important
that the federal government should create a national access advisory
committee, reporting to the Ministers of Industry and Canadian
Heritage, to advise on emerging access requirements and what services
will be essential in a knowledge society. The advisory committee
should include balanced representation from industry and the
non-profit sector (Rec. 4.22). Its operation should be fully
consistent with the constitutional and statutory responsibilities of
the federal government and the CRTC with respect to communications
policy and regulation.
Access Steering Committee, April 1997
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References
http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/SSGF/ih01632f.html
http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/SSG/ih01632e.html