Canada's federal government has overruled a Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission decision to regulate Internet-based telephone service, a top Canadian official confirmed this week.

Ottawa's government "has decided to change the CRTC's decision on VoIP -- voice-over-Internet protocol phone service," Industry Minister Maxime Bernier said in a speech Wednesday at The Economic Club of Toronto. "More specifically, we are telling the CRTC to start deregulating 'access independent' VoIP services. These are the telephone services you get through a broadband Internet connection. Barriers to entry in this market are very low."

Bernier defended the decision by saying, "In a competitive sector, there is no reason to regulate some companies while others can offer the services they want at the prices they want..."

J.H. Snider, a wireless expert at the New America Foundation, said the decision is a positive move for competition but failed to address "that if you still have a monopoly for broadband services, you can discriminate against VoIP..."

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