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The Competition Bureau was the first to present at a week-long hearing in Gatineau, Que., examining whether the wireless wholesale market is sufficiently competitive. If the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission decides it is not, it will consider whether it should step in with regulations.

CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais challenged the Competition Bureau to back up its assertion the incumbents are behaving anti-competitively. “You really present no evidence of such behaviour,” he said.

The incumbent wireless providers – Rogers Communications Inc., BCE Inc. and Telus Corp. – have spent billions of dollars to build infrastructure to deliver wireless services across the country. The CRTC does not currently regulate wholesale wireless rates, but the government issued an interim rule last spring that caps the amount carriers can charge competitors for access to their networks at the average rate they charge their own retail customers.

Upstart carriers argue that if the commission regulated the rates the incumbent carriers can charge them to roam on their networks and share their towers, more wireless providers could compete and consumers would be better off. In particular, Quebecor Inc. has said wholesale roaming rates, or what one carrier charges another to use its network, are a key issue that the company will take into consideration before deciding whether to invest the money to become a fourth national wireless carrier.