Coming soon to a rural community near you? P.E.I.'s election and high-speed internet

For as long as there's been an internet, various P.E.I. governments have been promising to connect Islanders from tip-to-tip with its vast store of digital treasures.

"Unlike broadband networks in other provinces and states, P.E.I.'s will deliver top-speed connections into all parts of the province," crowed the Pat Binns government in 1997, promising email access at every Island school along with "full-motion video-conferencing."

In 2008 the Robert Ghiz Liberals proudly announced a deal with Aliant, reportedly involving no government investment, "to extend broadband services to every community in Prince Edward Island." (In fact government ended up paying $23 million to Aliant by way of an untendered contract for government phone service.)

And in November 2016, Wade MacLauchlan told P.E.I.'s Legislative Assembly "that by the end of next year we're going to have the best internet service in Canada."

And yet, as P.E.I. hurtles through the 2019 election campaign, each party has its own plan to deliver what might be the holy grail of Island politics: fast, reliable internet connections from Souris to Tignish. The same thing they promised in 2015. And for years before that.

Goal stays out of reach

One of the problems could be that before an Island government can fulfil its promise to provide universal high-speed access, the definition of high-speed changes.

The CRTC now says Canadians should have access to download speeds of 50 megabits per second. In 2011 the bar was set at 5 Mbps.

In March 2017, the P.E.I. government announced it was holding an internet speed test "to develop a province-wide map showing where speeds most need to be improved."

The results were never made public, but more than half the 4,400 test results came in under 5 Mbps. Nearly a quarter came in below 1.5 Mbps, speeds at which you can check your email but will probably take Netflix out of your evening plans.

Just before the election was called, the MacLauchlan government and the Trudeau Liberals announced a new $74-million deal to hook up nearly 30,000 P.E.I. customers to high-speed by 2021.

That deal involves only $3.5 million in provincial money, with the rest of the investment coming from the feds, Bell Canada and Xplornet, the two internet service providers involved.

Money for local ISPs

The province announced a further $10 million over five years to partner with local ISPs in improving their services on P.E.I., but that didn't stave off criticism that government was cutting those local ISPs out of the bulk of the money, providing tens of millions to their national competitors.

When asked why the province was once again partnering with Bell, MacLauchlan explained this deal is different than the one signed in 2008.

"We have in the agreement that will be put in place … performance standards and measures and milestones that are tied directly to whether people get paid," said MacLauchlan. "That's a good business practice and one that I'm quite happy to stand behind."

MacLauchlan also points out that, unlike the previous untendered contract awarded by the Ghiz government, a request for proposals was issued which led to this new contract with Bell.

Progressive Conservative Leader Dennis King was working in communications for the Pat Binns government back in the days Island schools were being hooked up with email access.

Better balance among ISPs: PCs

"I think part of the problem or challenge has been the standards or requirements of individuals have increased over the lifespan of what these commitments have been," said King.

King said there needs to be a better balance in P.E.I.'s plan between big and small ISPs, but stopped short of saying his party would look to redo the deal.

"A large part of the funding in the announcement that was made was a federal government commitment. What I'd like to do is get in and take a look at the agreement and have a discussion to find out how we can better utilize the local internet service providers."

'Contract discussions on track'

In terms of how far along the deal is, and whether a new P.E.I. government might be able to revisit the deal, a spokesperson for Bell said "contract discussions are on track and the full rollout schedule continues to be finalized."

A spokeperson for the P.E.I. government simply said "this project has been approved."

Green Leader Peter Bevan-Baker said previous Liberal governments have "failed pretty miserably" for more than a decade to deliver high-speed internet, and wondered aloud why government is going back to the same major players it's dealt with before.

He said backing Bell and Xplornet will help those companies in "essentially creating a monopoly here" at the expense of the Island's small ISPs.

'Share of the pie'

"It's not good in terms of quality of service," Bevan-Baker said. "It's certainly not good in terms of competitive pricing."

Like the PCs, the Green solution is to "give [local ISPs] a share of the pie. You don't give it all away to Bell and Xplornet," said Bevan-Baker.

NDP Leader Joe Byrne said P.E.I. has tried and failed too many times to get the private sector to expand internet service into rural areas.

"This has to be publicly owned.… We can't rely on the economic development of rural P.E.I., on something as essential as internet backbone, to be privatized."

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