Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission

• FOUNDED: 1968
• TYPE OF ORGANIZATION: National broadcasting regulatory body

SIGNIFICANCE: The Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTTC) has primary control over radio and television broadcasting throughout Canada.

In 1976, the Canadian Parliament transferred to the CRTTC the jurisdiction over federally regulated telecommunications companies formerly exercised by the Canadian Transport Commission, changing its name to the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission. Since then, the CRTTC has decided on the issuance and renewal of licenses for all broadcasting undertakings, including networks and cable systems. It may attach conditions to licenses and make regulations respecting broadcasting. It may also revoke any license, except one issued to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). The full commission makes decisions involving the revocation of licenses, general broadcasting policies, and regulations and rules of procedure. Public consultation, through written notice and comment or public hearings, is a general practice. Among the important early decisions of the CRTTC were a provision for a minimum level of Canadian music on the air; rules respecting amounts of Canadian content in television schedules; licensing of third television networks in Ontario and Quebec; and the wide licensing of cable systems that would carry American programming directly to areas beyond the broadcasting range of US stations. A 1988 CRTTC decision prohibited access to any local television advertising market unless broadcasters provided a local program service in that market.

The 1970 Report of the Special (Canadian) Senate Committee on the Mass Media, the so-called Davey Report (after its chair, Senator Keith Davey), helped focus light on the state of Canadian mass media. The section of the report on broadcasting helped provide much of the framework for the 1974 CRTTC hearings on the renewal of broadcast licenses. The briefs presented to the CRTTC were overwhelmingly in support of public broadcasting.

The fifteen-member Senate Committee report began by calling broadcasting “The Beast of Burden”—an institution saddled, unlike any other medium, with responsibility for holding the country and its culture together. It immediately took a jab at private broadcasters, pointing out that they, too, were expected to share the burden. The report added that the 1968 Broadcasting Act had declared the airwaves to be public, not private property, and that “Canadians had a right to expect that broadcasters would use that public property to strengthen our culture, rather than dilute it.” This Senate committee thought that the CBC was “a national institution in a country that lacks national institutions.” It was a unique institution, made vulnerable by an unfortunate reliance on commercial revenue and annual appropriations from Parliament.

The CRTTC's work continued into the 2020s. Canada's internet prices have historically been some of the highest in the world. In 2023, CRTTC's president, Vicky Eatrides, vowed to investigate ways to decrease prices and increase the quality of internet products available in the country. It also required large telecom companies to share fibre-to-the-home networks with smaller providers to boost competition and lower internet prices, and it ordered foreign streaming services, such as Netflix and Spotify, to contribute 5 percent of their Canadian revenues to fund Canadian and Indigenous programming. The CRTTC also launched a temporary fund in 2025 to support local radio news, while continuing work to expand high-speed internet access to all Canadians.

Bibliography

"About Us." Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, 6 June 2025, crtc.gc.ca/eng/acrtc/org.htm. Accessed 30 Aug. 2025.

“Canada Says Online Streaming Services Must Hand Over 5% of Their Domestic Revenues.” Reuters, 4 June 2024, www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/canada-says-online-streaming-services-must-hand-over-5-their-domestic-revenues-2024-06-04. Accessed 30 Aug. 2025.

"Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission." Government of Canada, open.canada.ca/data/organization/crtc. Accessed 30 Aug. 2025.

"Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-22)." Justice Laws Website, 28 Aug. 2025, laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-22. Accessed 30 Aug. 2025.

Dobby, Christine. "‘What Has the CRTC Done for Me?’ New Chair of Telecom Regulator Takes Aim at Canada’s High Internet Prices." Toronto Star, 21 Jan. 2023, www.thestar.com/business/what-has-the-crtc-done-for-me-new-chair-of-telecom-regulator-takes-aim-at/article_ef42b077-0c64-532f-aee4-7d6addaca889.html. Accessed 30 Aug. 2025.