Tuesday, June 01, 2010

Europe - EC finds markets are more competitive as a result of Article 7 procedure

[ec] A European Commission report released today shows that EU telecoms markets have become more competitive thanks to the Commission's guidance in the consultation and review process known as the 'Article 7 procedure', whereby national telecoms regulators inform the Commission in advance of their plans to regulate parts of their national telecoms markets. As a result, citizens and businesses enjoy greater choice of services and cheaper prices. However, the report also indicates that a single EU telecoms market is still far from reality, which is why the Commission's Digital Agenda for Europe (IP/10/581) calls for swift and consistent enforcement of existing telecoms rules and indicates that the Commission intends to propose appropriate steps to reduce the cost of the absence of a Single Market in telecoms services. Problems include different national regulatory approaches to tackling competition issues, such as regulating access to fibre networks. Today's report also warns that regulatory uncertainty could hamper the roll out of investment-intensive infrastructure projects like Next Generation Access (NGA) networks, one of the flagships of the Digital Agenda for Europe.

Telecoms: Commission report on national telecoms regulation shows more competition but no Single Market

No comments: