Summary

  • A scoreboard without a starting score is a prop. Canada’s new telecom roadmap says the federal government will monitor five indicators and report on progress. It does not say what counts as progress, when the first score will appear, or who must supply each number.
  • That gap matters because the roadmap bundles 18 actions with different owners and different clocks. Some are already in force; some remain under consultation; others are plans for later. A single “competition and affordability” verdict could easily turn a busy action list into an outcome claim.

The Government of Canada’s Telecom Competition Roadmap, modified on 28 October, groups its actions under three aims: widen competitive choice, help consumers get better prices, and enable investment in networks. Its closing section names five possible measures: Internet and cellular prices, customer switching, speeds, coverage, and complaints and resolution. The government says it will monitor progress and report on the impact for Canadians.

The list sounds measurable. The missing parts are the test. The roadmap gives no baseline for these indicators, no numeric target, no date or frequency for the promised report, and no named owner for collecting or validating each measure. It says the list “may include, but is not limited to” the five measures, leaving the scoreboard open to additions without describing how the set will stay comparable over time.

The actions themselves do not share one clock. The roadmap points to rules that already took effect, CRTC work still being finalized, consultations on tower siting and consumer codes, and spectrum releases planned over several years. A count of actions completed cannot stand in for lower prices or better coverage. Nor can a national average show whether switching became easier in the places where one network still dominates.

That distinction is central to the document’s final promise. If progress is unsatisfactory, the Government says it is prepared to take further action, including revising policy direction to the CRTC. But “unsatisfactory” has no public threshold here. Without a baseline and a dated test, the trigger can move after the result is known.

A useful first report would publish the definitions, source, geography, denominator and time window for each indicator before presenting a trend. Prices need a comparable service basket; switching needs a measure of completed switches and failed attempts; speed and coverage need a stated method; complaints need a consistent count and resolution clock. These are questions the roadmap leaves open, not findings about how its future monitoring will work.

The first report’s date, baseline and measurement rules are the missing evidence that would change this judgment. Until they appear, the roadmap is a substantial action catalogue with an unbuilt scoreboard.

Source: Government of Canada, Telecom competition roadmap.