Montreal, March 28, 2006 – Following the recent release of the Telecom Policy Review Panel’s report, the Quebec Coalition of Internet Service Providers (QCISP) made the following statement:

In the best interest of consumers and industry members, QCISP welcomes a progressive deregulation of the Telecom market supervised by a competition tribunal to ensure consumer protection and control of anti-competitive conduct. This reflects some of the key recommendations made last week by a panel of experts in a report commissioned by the Government of Canada.

The panel recognizes what the CRTC had denied in the past which is that the residential high speed Internet market is a duopoly composed of incumbent phone companies and cable companies. In order to protect consumers and industry members, the panel recommends eliminating market entry barriers for new competitors. The intended result is to reduce the market share of incumbent phone companies and cable companies below the mark of 50%.

In this regard, the Coalition had already started soliciting the CRTC’s intervention on November 23rd 2005 in order to reduce the extravagant profit margins set by incumbent phone and cable companies for the mandatory provisioning of the service to competitors while setting profit margins for their own retail offer much lower.

The Coalition represents the interests of 15 Internet service providers and dozens of thousands of customers across Quebec who have chosen an Internet provider other than their phone or cable company.

However, in order for the Coalition members to be able to compete with incumbent phone and cable companies, it is crucial that the wholesale rates allow a progressive transition towards ownership of the installations by competitors. Since the wholesale tariffs are maintained abnormally high by the big players, the competitors’ total cost structure is systematically higher than that of the phone and cable companies. This situation perpetuates a duopoly without any real competition, which the panel has concluded is against the public interest.

Contrary to the position recently retained by the FCC in the United States, the 5-year transition period proposed by the panel recognizes the necessity for rigour, accountability and transparency during this transition. The aim is to avoid unrolling the red carpet for the duopoly, whose potential effects are:

1) the intensification of the big companies’ dominant position over the market;
2) elimination of competition;
3) and ultimately, costs increase for consumers.

This scenario would create the opposite effect then that intended by the deregulation of the market.

About the Quebec Coalition of Internet Service Providers

The Quebec Coalition of Internet Service Providers, a group formed of 15 Quebec ISPs, has come together to defend the best interests of consumers and smaller Internet service providers.

The Coalition believes consumers are better served in a market promoting fair competition. The Coalition’s mandate, therefore, is to advocate for CRTC regulations to end the problems encountered by unsustainable competition in the Internet and telecommunications market today, as well as to raise public awareness on issues ultimately affecting us all.

For more information about the Coalition of Quebec Internet Service Providers, please visit www.quebecispcoalition.ca.

The TSX Venture Exchange does not accept responsibility for the adequacy and accuracy of this release.

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For more information or to coordinate an interview with the Coalition representative, please contact:

Isabelle Johnson
Marketing Communications
Inter.net Canada Ltd.
Uniserve Communications Corporation
(514) 481-5715 x4871
johnsoni@team.ca.inter.net