EU Disagrees on Key E-Communications Overhaul Proposals

One dispute concerns a proposal to create a Body of European Regulators in Telecoms to advise the EC, national authorities and the parliament on regulatory issues, paid for by the European Community and national contributions. Chatel said most governments oppose creating the body, whose financing depends on the legal authority it’s based on.

Spectrum management is another sensitive subject, said Chatel. The industry committee approved a proposal reaching beyond what governments want on a coordinated approach to harmonizing and allocating frequencies, he said. The EC wants cooperation on the use of digital dividend spectrum and more flexible use and harmonized spectrum trading, it said. Governments are “rather reluctant” to accept trans-border coordination of spectrum management or giving lawmakers a stronger voice in the matter, the EC said.

Discussion with the council on ensuring an EU-wide internal market in e-communications will be difficult, said Viviane Reding, the information society and media commissioner. The EC welcomes parliament’s proposal for a community body, but it must be customized, efficient, fair, reliable and above suspicion of capture, she said. Any national financing would put the body’s independence in question, she said. Reding continued to press for EC veto power over national regulatory decisions, an idea unpopular with lawmakers who want the decisions handled jointly by BERT and the EC.

There are other points of disagreement, the EC said. It wants national regulators to be independent of government and operators. MEPs back that view, but the Council signalled it only will accept greater regulatory independence in the context of market-related rules, not in spectrum management, security or other potentially sensitive areas, the EC said.

Functional separation of a dominant player’s infrastructure and services arms remains a prickly topic. Parliamentary committees support the proposed competition remedy, as do most telecommunications ministers and all national regulators, the EC said. But “in view of the strong opposition of several incumbent operators to the introduction of the tool of functional separation, the final outcome of this debate is still uncertain,” it said.

An internal market committee report on universal service and consumers rights drew strong criticism from some MEPs. In July, the panel approved provisions urging national regulators to encourage operators to collaborate to promote legal content, and to send warning letters to users engaged in illegal downloading, infringement or child porn. Report author, Malcolm Harbour, EPP-ED-U.K., said Tuesday that “consumers are entitled to be informed about some of the problems they might encounter,” whether the potential for copyright infringement or unauthorized use or buying products that could harm their health. Electronic service providers should have to carry public service messages like TV channels do, he said.

Some legislators accused Harbour of endangering net neutrality and privacy. Members of the Greens Party said they oppose efforts to legislate copyright protection and to quash free expression and Internet services. The overhaul package should be about e-communications infrastructure, not ISPs policing the Net, an MEP said. But others said net neutrality is needed, but free expression has a price. ISPs must help prevent illegitimate use of platforms, one said. Rights holders need additional protection, said another.

EU bodies must work on networks and content, said Eric Besson, minister of state to the French Prime Minister responsible for development of the digital economy. The French Presidency doesn’t want to impose its “graduated response” anti-piracy regime on other countries, and sees the need to protect personal data and privacy, he said.

Harbour is “absolutely astounded” by charges that his report threatens net neutrality, he said. The committee took pains to ensure that national regulators are able to intervene if they see providers not handling traffic in a neutral manner, he said. But lawmakers have an obligation to help France reach a decision on this issue, because companies seeking to invest in new networks and services need certainty, he said.

Trade groups, meanwhile, continued to lobby lawmakers before the plenary session Sept. 25-28. The European Competitive Telecommunications Association updated its broadband scorecard Monday. The report showed Europe with more than 100 million broadband subscribers and said alternate providers lead in offering speeds exceeding 10 Mbps.

But the access lines over which broadband services move remain mostly in incumbents’ hands, ECTA said. Policymakers need to balance alternate players’ access to networks and the fair return network owners get on their investments , ECTA said. The debate “seems to be swinging too far in favor of the incumbents,” it said.

The European Telecommunications Network Operators’ Association rejected the idea of mandatory access to fiber networks. It urged MEPs not to bar operators from offering different levels of quality and speed, as long as markets are competitive and consumer transparency guaranteed. ETNO also opposed inclusion of content-related provisions in the reform package, saying the best anti-piracy solution is wide availability of legal online services.