Canadians price-gouged by large telecom conglomerates

Canadians are still being price- gouged by three telecom giants -- Bell, Rogers and Telus, the Canadian Radio-Television Telecommunications Commission said in an annual report released Thursday.

Canadian telecom sector remains dominated by the three larger conglomerates, keeping prices high and blocking Canadians from new affordable options, the Communications Monitoring Report for 2014 showed.

The price of telephone, television, and Internet services rose up to 3.7 percent year-on-year despite the government promises of lower prices, while Canada's inflation was at 0.9 percent, demonstrating that telecom price increases were vastly outpacing the increasing costs of living in Canada, the report revealed.

It points out that Canada's economy and everyday Canadians will suffer for as long as just three large conglomerates control 90 percent of the country's telecom services.

On the crucial metric of average revenue per user, which gives a sense of how large the bills, Canada is the highest of the eight countries surveyed in the report. This falls in line with study after study showing Canada continues to experience some of the highest prices in the industrialized world.

Prices for basic wireless service are the highest amongst the eight industrialized nations compared in the report. This disproportionately hurts low-income Canadians who rely on these basic plans to connect with their friend, family, or pursue new economic opportunities.

Of the countries surveyed, Canada is dead last when it comes to mobile device penetration. U.S. mobile phone penetration rate is now 25 percent higher than Canada's, with Italy, Germany, and Australia nearly twice as high.

On mobile broadband penetration, Canada is at the back of the pack. The United States is shown as having almost double Canada's mobile broadband penetration, with Australia showing more than double. It confirms data showing thousands of rural and remote Canadians are living without access to high-speed Internet services.

Therefore, it is the time for decision-makers to take bold action and confront the broken and dysfunctional telecom market by opening the networks so that new, affordable, and innovative services can flourish in Canada, the report said.