Peter Menzies is a senior fellow with the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, a former publisher of the Calgary Herald and a previous vice-chair of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission .
There is much positive buzz surrounding Ms. Eatrides. One factor is that the commission she is inheriting is already deeply unpopular among those who advocate for consumers and service-based competition. The May 27, 2021, decision by outgoing chair Ian Scott’s CRTC concerning wholesale access rates for broadband services remains infamous. The bar for Ms. Eatrides has been set low.
There is also a very good chance that she will be more than ably assisted by Mr. Scott, the incoming vice-chair. Those who have crossed paths with him speak of a highly capable individual with decades of experience managing connectivity issues. Notably, neither Ms. Eatrides nor Mr. Scott bring any baggage from the traditional content creation sector that successfully lobbied for Bill C-11, the Online Streaming Act.
This will set the stage for Ms. Eatrides to make sense of Bill C-11 and attempt to prevent the many catastrophes it makes possible.