No, but if you were on a contract they can charge you the device cost prorated to how much time was left on your contract. And the new carrier can charge a setup or admin fee, though most carriers don’t for competitive reasons, or they call it a SIM card fee and waive it if you activate via eSIM. All the fine print in Plain English: https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/phone/mobile/num.htm

Actual ruling: https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2005/dt2005-72.htm

Further regulation covers number portability beyond the named carriers, and require all carriers to register with the CRTC, etc. https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2017/2017-11.htm In return, the CRTC helps guarantee access to the large players’ wholesale networks, though in practice the fight is still ongoing over newly installed fibre optic networks and the uncompetitive rates the incumbents charge for full speed service on their networks.

It’s not all good news - A particularly disappointing CRTC ruling followed Bell Canada’s recommendation that Canadian TV should only be provided via Internet if the household has internet from that TV provider directly. Which has effectively locked out any over the top competition such as YouTube TV from Canadian markets as they won’t be able to offer Canadian OTA channels. Sadly, I can’t find the ruling in the mess on the CRTC site, as CRTC language is obscure to say the least, but as TV is heavily regulated in Canada, the CRTC has old fashioned rules saying IPTV providers must provision a box and a line for service (Internet) in order to offer TV. This limits competition to only those willing to provide Internet in Canada to every household, or requires third-parties to negotiate with incumbents for access to such households. Existing third-party ISPs/Canadian IPTV companies go along with the above rules because nobody wants US providers entering the market, they just want to carve out cheaper Internet+TV price points with competitive Internet speeds that the incumbents don’t offer at competitive wholesale rates and benefit from a high switching cost where switching TV providers means switching ISPs knowing most people won’t do it. Until we have enough VOD content, Canadians are either pirating, using VPNs or paying their ISP for television, not having any other legal choices in this country...

While I can’t find the ruling just yet, here’s an article from 2015 highlighting Bell’s requirement that IPTV be restricted to ISP lines: https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bell-crtc-25-basic-tv-1.375... And here’s an article where Bell refused to license their networks to VMedia’s Roku app arguing that by going over the public Internet, VMedia was running the content on a private network outside Bell’s control (Most IPTV providers find it cheaper to bundle with Bell’s VDSL) https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bell-vmedia-iptv-internet-r... This later led to the ruling that only ISPs can provide TV...

Personally I’m more irritated by how much VOD content Bell has exclusive license to, such as their Crave+HBO, which is cheap for now, but helps Bell compete with channels offered by Amazon Prime Video. Corus, formerly owned by Shaw (another cable provider) licenses a lot of US content, and so might limit what content is available north of the border. It’s particularly hard to find VOD episodes from Turner and Viacom networks and the expanded licensing STARZ has with Hulu is completely absent north of the border. When you can’t find a show legally on any VOD network in your country including iTunes, what are you supposed to do...? CRTC rules are not making this any easier for Canadians to watch what they want, wherever they want (ISP requirement means your cell phone must also have service from your IPTV provider, it’s nuts), and on whatever device they want...