The density argument is utter BS. A vast majority of the population is concentrated in 5 very dense cities, and no one is asking the incumbents to provide FTTH to every house in Nunavut.
It’s cartel behavior at its best. The Canadian telecom landscape is a sick joke.
The rural argument also never made sense because why not just start a nationalized ISP or subsidy that purely serves the rural north? Why sarcrifice the competitiveness of whole countries ISP market for a very small part of the country?
The same argument is used for keeping the postal service public when you could just subsidize the parts of the market that wouldn’t be self-sustaining rather than propping up the entire money-losing crown business. Burning tax dollars at the parcel delivery business in the age of e-commerce is a sad joke.
The whole “rural people are being protected” seems like a cover story for powerful friends of politicians to keep the money train rolling, and regular people eat it up on social media.
Plus Starlink et al has rendered the rural argument moot.
It’s cartel behavior at its best. The Canadian telecom landscape is a sick joke.