Submissions of the Government of Nunavut

1. Submissions of the Government of Nunavut

2. 1,932,255 km2 (746,048 sq mi) of land 25 communities = 33,000 people No roads or cables into any community or between communities No banks, no doctors in most communities Lowest average income in Canada Highest cost of living in Canada

3. High Cost of Living

4. High Cost of Living

5. High Cost of Living

6. Purchasing non-locally means communicating with southern suppliers and shippers

7. January 20, 2011 In Nunavut, doctors are few and far between Only 15 reside in territory, compared with 115 in Yukon, 65 in NWT NUNATSIAQ NEWS Northerners feel the country’s doctor shortage much more acutely than southern Canadians, says the latest Conference Board of Canada look at disparities between the two regions. In a project called Somebody Call a Doctor, researchers use 2006 census data to determine that the population-to-physician ration in the North can be 2,000 to one and even higher, depending on the region, compared to 400 to one in southern regions.

8. All telecommunications go through one satellite. • Only Iqaluit has ADSL internet • but high demand means low transmission speed. • Other communities have dial-up internet only • Not all communities have cellphone service • Only Iqaluit has EVDO cellphone • Other communities have older cellphone technology

9. BANDWIDTH IS EXTREMELY LIMITED

10. What Nunavummiut say: “I have to take a two-hour course to keep my professional licence. The course is available for free by webinar but you can’t stream it on our internet connections, and the regulator won’t send me a DVD. I have to fly to south for two hours, and it will cost me $2500 in airfare, an overnight in a hotel, and two days I’ll never get back.”

11. ATTENTION: All Users Re: Qikiqtani General Hospital Network Data Outage   Please be advised that the GN Core business network at the Qikiqtani General Hospital is currently unavailable. Northwestel is aware of this issue and is working on restoring service. Telephone services are not affected.   We will provide updates as soon as they are available. Thank you, GN Service Desk

12. ATTENTION: ALL USERS RE: Pangnirtung Voice Issues Please be advised there are intermittent problems with voice calls to and from Pangnirtung.  This is a NorthwesTel issue and a technician from NorthwesTel will be travelling to the community to resolve these problems.  We will provide updates as soon as they are available from NorthwesTel.    Email and internet connections are not affected. GN Service Desk

13. Attention: All Users Re: Network Congestion from Communities  Please be advised that at this time we are experiencing high network congestion from the decentralized communities back to Iqaluit. A major contributor to this congestion is due to the ongoing Galaxy 15 issue. As the links back to Iqaluit were being restored a high influx of data has now begun to be transferred. At this time the following communities are affected:  -      Cambridge Bay -       Kugluktuk -       Gjoa Haven -       Rankin Inlet -       Arviat -       Baker Lake -       Coral Harbour -       Pond Inlet -       Pangnirtung -       Igloolik -       Cape Dorset At this time NorthwesTel/Ardicom is working on restoring the original configuration to these links. GN Service Desk

14. “Yes, we have electronic medical records now, but we don’t have the bandwidth to transmit them.”

15. “I’m sorry, I’m getting a horrible echo on this line. Hang up and I’ll call back and see if we can’t get a better connection.”

16. When people come to Nunavut they say: “My smartphone doesn’t work here.”

17. “I tried to download data from headoffice and the connection kept timing out.”

18. “I could never live like this”

19. THE ARCTIC IS OF INTEREST TO THE WHOLE WORLD

20. Climate Change Research Geological Research Mapping, Developing the Northwest Passage Air and Sea Navigation Adventure Tourism Mining Development Petroleum Development Sovereignty Military Readiness and Maneuvers Emergency Response

21. A “profound communication failure” during Operation Nanook 2009 resulted in the Northern Communications and Information Systems Working Group. (NCIS-WG) • Led by Canadian Forces • Includes Territorial Governments and • several Federal agencies/departments

23. It is clear from the data that Arctic access to communication services is not keeping pace with southern access to communication services. This is not simply a matter of people having to wait an extra few seconds or even minutes to get a web page to load. It is the difference between being able to actually do the job at hand, or not being able to do it at all. ACIA Report p.80

24. NUNAVUT IS GROWING

25. % POPULATION BY AGE July 2009

26. Mineral exploration expenditures for 2011 are projected to reach $400 million. Three projects in development: • Mary River Iron (est. capital cost $4.1 billion)  • Meliadine Gold (est. capital cost $800 million) • Hope Bay Gold (est. capital cost $800 million) All three should be reaching production in next 5 years, adding 2000 new direct jobs.

27. Northwestel’s Plan for Dealing with Current Unmet Need and Expected Explosive Growth…

28. Provide “call waiting” in one more community Raise rates Maintain its monopoly Maintain the wholly unacceptable bandwidth and service levels while demand continues to grow

29. No matter how you slice it, delivering affordable bandwidth to Arctic communities is an expensive business, that cannot be borne by the purchasers of service alone, nor by private sector providers that require a return on their investment to stay in business. ACIA report p. 88

30. The user-pay model works where there exist both physical infrastructure - landlines in and out - and a population density which subsidizes the costs of serving the rural or remote consumer. Nunavut has neither.

31. Nunavut • the whole of the north – needs a different delivery model

32. Nunavut is 1,932,255 km2 of last mile

33. In Australia, Sweden and parts of the United States, the state owns the backbone and private enterprise delivers the last mile.  ACIA Report p.160 That is a feasible approach in the north.

34. Government is the single largest purchaser of communications in the north and has contributed over $134 million to existing infrastructure in recent years ACIA Report p.89

35. Modern telecommunication will also enable cost saving in delivering health, education, and other government services.

36. Presently, government services must be conducted in a manner that is more expensive and labour intensive… government must maintain two systems: one for those with broadband and one for those without… It is more expensive when a public servant must physically travel to a community to do business that could otherwise be conducted by internet.... ACIA Report p.159

37. Mining companies are willing to build infrastructure to support their projects.

38. So there are sources of funding for communications infrastructure BUT As long as Northwestel has a monopoly on basic services, no new delivery model can be implemented. 

39. If Northwestel’s monopoly is continued, in four or five years, we will be making all these arguments again, and the North will be four or five years further behind the rest of the world.

40. There is probably no other industry where competition is so vital in lowering price, adding innovation and improving what has essentially become a public good. ACIA Report p.186

41. What Nunavut Asks of CRTC • No rate increase in Nunavut • No more monopolistic advantages for Northwestel

42. Thank you