NL Short Takes
telecom | 03/29/2006 5:00 am EST
CEP wants end to secret trade talks on foreign ownership of telcosThe Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada, the country’s largest union of telecommunications and media workers, is calling on the Harper government to end secret trade talks that would open up the domestic telephone industry to foreign ownership. Brian Payne, president of the 150,000-member union, spoke in reaction to a leaked document from the General Agreement on Trade in Services talks in Geneva which shows Canada has signed on to a "plurilateral request" for World Trade Organization member nations to essentially do away with foreign ownership limits in telecommunications. "If our trade bureaucrats at the GATS talks have decided on their own to use telecommunications as a bargaining chip, they are doing so contrary to existing Canadian law and should be ordered to stop," said Payne at a news conference on Parliament Hill. Because telecommunications and broadcasting are essentially one industry, says Payne, removing foreign
...