Bill forces companies to share average download speeds

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OTTAWA — A private member’s bill meant to bring more truth in advertising to internet plans has cleared both the House of Commons and the Senate and is on its way to becoming law.

Conservative MP Dan Mazier’s Bill C-288 would have the CRTC require internet companies to include in their advertising the average download and upload speeds of an internet plan, not just the maximum speeds, and also disclose the speeds during peak demand times.

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The bill, first introduced in 2022, only needs royal assent, which is expected soon. After it becomes law, the CRTC would have to hold hearings with the public and industry on new advertising standards.

Mazier said the current system allows companies to sell consumers download and upload speeds that are advertised at their top end. Service can be described, for example, as offering downloads of up to 50 megabytes per second, but might only rarely deliver speeds that fast.

“We realized that the internet companies or internet service providers right now are allowed to sell you up to speed or theoretical speed and that didn’t fit well with us,” he said. “There’s no other industry in Canada that could sell a consumer a product like that.”

He said the pandemic put considerable pressure on home internet and overstressed networks were slowed down.

“A lot of these internet companies couldn’t keep up with the demand, and so they get oversubscribed, and then they have to control what’s going on and manage the system, so they slow everything down,” he said.

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Scott Hutton, a CRTC official, has said before that the regulator wants to bring about uniform disclosure standards so Canadians can know what they’re buying. He said the CRTC had been pursuing similar efforts, but the bill would help get the work done.

“We intend to examine how to measure service quality and typical download and upload speeds during peak periods. We want to make sure that Canadians can compare apples to apples when shopping for internet services,” he told senators studying the legislation last month.

Hutton said the CRTC hoped that having clear measurable standards would also bring down costs for consumers.

“This will help with prices by providing Canadians with clear, precise, concise information that allows them to shop, compare and contrast the offers out there to make those decisions.”

Mazier’s bill made its way through the House and Senate relatively unchanged and received unanimous support in both chambers. Private member’s bills rarely become law, usually sidetracked for government businesses.

Mazier said he is pleased the legislation was able to sail through.

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“It’s a really good example of what a private member’s bill can do,” he said.

National Post
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