TAKARA 1: The first principle of Canada’s Digital Charter states that “all Canadians will have equal opportunity to participate in the digital world and the necessary tools to do so, including access, connectivity, literacy, and skills.”
Well, over the last 5 episodes we’ve been exploring where the country is falling short on those ambitions, and just what it means to be disconnected in a world where so much of life happens online.
But, if the secret to making progress is getting started…it’s about time we began looking at some solutions.
Having heard about these problems, and the impact they have on Canadians, we want to close the series by looking forward…
CLIP: (Simpsons cut - 5 seconds)
TAKARA 2: Yes, we want to talk tactics! How can things get better? What are the approaches we need…and what are the chances of that happening?
We’ve assembled our own avengers for the job - we’re going to hear from so me of our experts from earlier in the series, as well as some new voices.
Yes, it’s a bumper episode of What’s Up With the Internet? - all brought to you by CIRA - the Canadian Internet Registration Authority.
And I’m your host, Takara Small!
CLIP: (Record scratch SFX)
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TAKARA 3: Now we began this series with some really great conversations about Canada’s Urban/Rural divide, and how that affects internet access.
That particularly applies to our First Nations communities, where only about 43% of people on reserves have high speed internet. A slow rollout of connections to those parts of the country was criticized by the Auditor General, Karen Hogan, earlier this year:
CLIP: (Karen Hogan cut - 30 seconds)
TAKARA 4: So we figured the person best placed to talk to about this was the Government Minister for rural communities.
Gudie Hutchings MP, the Federal Minister for Rural Economic Affairs, joined us from Ottawa.
CLIP: (Minister Gudie Hutchings - 15 minutes)
TAKARA 5: Federal Minister Gudie Hutchings there…
But as we know there’s another big divide to address, and that’s the Rich/Poor divide.
It’s a gap that is growing not just in Canada, but all around the world. So how might we bridge that gap?
Mark Bulel is working on one approach that will be a help to both problems. We spoke to Mark earlier in the series, and he’s part of the team at Connect Humanity.
It’s an organization helping local communities get themselves connected through co-ops:
CLIP: (Mark Buell - 4 minutes)
TAKARA 6: So progress is happening at a local level.
Joel Templeman, from the Internet Society’s Manitoba Chapter, spoke to us in our second episode.
Like Mark, Joel is feeling positive about the impact organizations like his are having:
CLIP: (Joel Templeman - 2 minutes)
TAKARA 7: And that once again brings us to competition.
New leadership at the CRTC (that’s the body that regulates and supervises broadcasting and telecommunications in Canada) has created hope that maybe the country can stand up to the big Telecoms giants, and we might get some better laws around competition.
Here’s Bryson Masse, who we first spoke to back in Episode 3:
CLIP: (Bryson Masse - 5 minutes)
TAKARA 8: Okay…so, we’ll leave the last word of the series to the team here at CIRA.
As a non-profit that advocates for a more equitable internet for all Canadians, it makes sense that we get some input straight from the horse’s mouth.
Charles Noir is the Vice President of Community Investment, Policy and Advocacy:
CLIP: (Charles Noir CIRA interview - 22 minutes)
TAKARA 9: And that was Charles Noir from the team here at CIRA.
So, that brings our series to a close! We hope we’ve been able to unravel some of the knots of Canada’s internet for you over the last 6 episodes.
If you’re in the mood for more, you can of course visit the CIRA website at CIRA.ca and there’s a tonne of helpful information and resources on there about everything we’ve discussed.
You can also become a member if you’re feeling inspired to improve Canada’s internet, and lot’s more as well.
If you like what you’ve heard through this series, please give us a comment and a rating wherever you get your podcasts.
Thank you so much for listening - bye!