Podcasts Archive - Public Interest Advocacy Centre https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/ Public Internet Advocacy Centre Wed, 13 Nov 2024 15:44:58 +0000 en-CA hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 Ep. 32 – The Big Fix https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/ep-32-the-big-fix/ Wed, 13 Nov 2024 15:41:00 +0000 https://www.piac.ca/?post_type=podcasts&p=3607 EPISODE SUMMARY New PIAC Executive Director and General Counsel, Geoff White, is pleased to take the reins of the podcast and interviews Denis Hearn and Vass Bednar about their urgent, clear and accessible book, “The Big Fix”, which seeks to explain why Canada has a competition problem and how to fix it. EPISODE NOTES Geoff […]

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EPISODE SUMMARY

New PIAC Executive Director and General Counsel, Geoff White, is pleased to take the reins of the podcast and interviews Denis Hearn and Vass Bednar about their urgent, clear and accessible book, “The Big Fix”, which seeks to explain why Canada has a competition problem and how to fix it.

EPISODE NOTES

Geoff White, PIAC’s new Executive Director and General Counsel interviews authors Denise Hearn and Vass Bednar about their eye-opening new book, “The Big Fix”, which reveals the extent of Canada’s inability to get competition in Canada right. Canadians pay too much, have limited market choices, little control of their shopping experience and suffer intrusive surveillance mostly due to the inability of Canadian regulators to halt mergers in areas such as food retailing, telecommunications, financial services and even veterinary services.

Hearn and Bednar outline their potential solutions to address this market power, to provide a democratic and consumer-driven solution to make the market less “fixed” against Canadians. These include not only a more stringent review of mergers but also a ‘whole of government’ approach to competition effects on all parts of the economy. Gosh, they even discuss the prospect of structural separation in telecommunications and promotion of human flourishing as an outcome of markets. This is a refreshing and provocative discussion about putting consumers first – a goal PIAC has pursued for 40 plus years, and will pursue in the future.

Buy the book from Sutherland House: https://sutherlandhousebooks.com/product/the-big-fix/

Listen to the podcast:

https://wefightforthat.simplecast.com/episodes/the-big-fix

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

SHOW CONTRIBUTORS
Denise Hearn
Vass Bednar
Geoff White

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]]> Ep. 28 – Post-Rogers-Shaw: A New Hope? https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/ep-28-post-rogers-shaw-a-new-hope/ Thu, 03 Aug 2023 16:56:28 +0000 https://www.piac.ca/?post_type=podcasts&p=3495 PIAC speaks with George Burger, VMedia Chief Operating Officer, about the post-Rogers-Shaw competitive environment and why VMedia's acquisition by Quebecor Media Inc, is different, and better, for consumers than all of the other acquisitions of independent ISPs that followed. George is very convincing and he almost had us there, hoping against hope. In any case, we troll through the wreckage of the Canadian Internet market after its torpedoing by the CRTC's wholesale Internet rate reversal in 2021 and to some extent the prospects for Freedom to be good again. We'll see.
CONTRIBUTORS
George Burger
John Lawford

KEYWORDS
internet
consumers
competition
wireless
rogers-shaw
wholesale
canada

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Post-Rogers-Shaw: A New Hope?

Well, we are back after a long hiatus (sorry, stuff going on in Canadian communications!) to survey the competitive landscape after the Rogers-Shaw deal closed in Spring of 2023 – two years and 15 days after being announced.

We speak with George Burger, Chief Operating Officer, about the Canadian home Internet market post-Rogers-Shaw; why VMedia and Videotron (Quebecor) are a strong independent disrupter outside Québec that will only help consumers, and why the wireless market may just reward us with a strong 4th player (yes, please!).

Not quite sure if it’s going to come true, but hopium at this stage is good.

We end with a dunk on those people who thought Bill C-11 meant more money for Canadian creators.  Turns out traditional broadcasters are not as keen on funding it when they think someone else will pay.

 

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]]> Ep. 15 – Banking Complaints: Roadmap or roadkill? https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/ep-15-banking-complaints-roadmap-or-roadkill/ Fri, 04 Feb 2022 22:27:35 +0000 https://www.piac.ca/?post_type=podcasts&p=3312 We explore how consumers in Canada can make a complaint about banking services (mortgages, loans, lines of credit, credit cards, joint accounts, etc. etc.) both to their own bank and to third party ombudsmans. Sorry, did you say "ombudsmans"? Yes, I did - we have competing dispute resolution services or "external complaints bodies" in Canada. Why? No reason. But we do our best to tell you how to navigate this Kafka-esque space, what to look for and how to react.

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]]> We explore how consumers in Canada can make a complaint about banking services (mortgages, loans, lines of credit, credit cards, joint accounts, etc. etc.) both to their own bank and to third party ombudsmans. Sorry, did you say “ombudsmans”? Yes, I did – we have competing dispute resolution services or “external complaints bodies” in Canada. Why? No reason. But we do our best to tell you how to navigate this Kafka-esque space, what to look for and how to react.

PIAC’s articling student, Rene Kimmett, guests on this episode to explain how consumers can complain about banking services to their own financial institution and to third-party resolution services – yes, there are two “external complaints bodies” in Canada – OBSI and ADRBO. No need for that – which we get into. The Federal Department of Finance and the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (FCAC) are presently implementing improvements to the internal complaints system inside banks, but we still have battling third party ECBs. Finance can fix this in a wink. We argue why they should and how consumers can advance their complaint, and hopefully get their money back, in this bizarre system. Advice to consumers: push, push, push!

This is the first of a series of four podcasts on financial matters. Future podcasts: investment complaints; payday and installment loans; cryptocurrencies for consumers (not!).

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]]> Episode 14 – Where would you like these lumps of coal? https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/episode-14-where-would-you-like-these-lumps-of-coal/ Thu, 23 Dec 2021 21:10:22 +0000 https://www.piac.ca/?post_type=podcasts&p=3310 The post Episode 14 – Where would you like these lumps of coal? appeared first on Public Interest Advocacy Centre.

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]]> Episode 9: Airline Bailouts = Consumer Refunds! We won! with Tahira Dawood https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/episode-9-airline-bailouts-consumer-refunds-we-won-with-tahira-dawood/ Mon, 03 May 2021 17:11:49 +0000 https://piac.ca/?post_type=podcasts&p=2885 The post Episode 9: Airline Bailouts = Consumer Refunds! We won! with Tahira Dawood appeared first on Public Interest Advocacy Centre.

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]]> Episode 2 – Mystery Shopping with Marina Pavlovic – Your Internet Mileage May Vary – Mea culpa COVID appa https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/episode-2-mystery-shopping-with-marina-pavlovic-your-internet-mileage-may-vary-mea-culpa-covid-appa/ Thu, 15 Oct 2020 01:03:27 +0000 http://piac.staging.craftandcrew.ca/?post_type=podcasts&p=2813 The post Episode 2 – Mystery Shopping with Marina Pavlovic – Your Internet Mileage May Vary – Mea culpa COVID appa appeared first on Public Interest Advocacy Centre.

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]]> Episode 1 – We fight for that https://www.piac.ca/podcasts/episode-1-we-fight-for-that/ Fri, 11 Sep 2020 02:49:01 +0000 http://piac.staging.craftandcrew.ca/?post_type=podcasts&p=2798 The post Episode 1 – We fight for that appeared first on Public Interest Advocacy Centre.

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