EUROPE'S STARK CHOICE: OPEN MARKETS OR STAGNATION

Member States taken to task for depriving their markets of further investment by protecting monopolies; Call for competition to remain at the heart of the 2006 Telecoms review

Brussels, 2 December 2005 - A new Jones Day and SPC Network study finds that investment in the EU telecoms sector could be put at risk if governments and regulators allow historic telecoms monopolies to re-establish their grip on the market. The Regulatory Scorecard, commissioned by ECTA, concludes that across 16 EU countries, investment in telecoms has suffered where regulation has failed to tackle dominant companies, whilst countries that have opened their markets to competition by imposing effective regulation have stormed ahead.

EU E-COMMUNICATIONS INDUSTRY REGRETS TODAY EP VOTE, PUTTING EUROPE'S COMPETITIVENESS AND INFORMATION SOCIETY AT STAKE

Brussels – E-communications services providers, through their trade associations, regret that members of the European Parliament did not support the amendments of theParliament’s own Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs Committee by rejecting the Report of Mr. Alvaro MEP. In doing so, the Parliament has failed to take the opportunity to rectify a text that still raises major concerns about the technical feasibility and proportionality of proposed measures. Furthermore, despite strong protestations from MEPs that any Directive must aim towards a harmonisation of data retention measures, the text adopted today provides very little harmonisation.

E-COMMUNICATIONS SERVICE PROVIDERS CALL FOR FURTHER DIALOGUE ON DATA RETENTION AT EU LEVEL

Newcastle - Europe's e-communications service providers called upon EU Justice and Home Affairs Ministers to pursue an open consultation with the industry before adopting any mandatory data retention measures.  Newcastle - Europe's e-communications service providers called upon EU Justice and Home Affairs Ministers to pursue an open consultation with the industry before adopting any mandatory data retention measures.  Newcastle - Europe's e-communications service providers called upon EU Justice and Home Affairs Ministers to pursue an open consultation with the industry before adopting any mandatory data retention measures. 

E-COMMUNICATIONS SERVICE PROVIDERS REMAIN SERIOUSLY CONCERNED WITH THE AGREEMENT REACHED BY EU JUSTICE MINISTERS TO STORE RECORDS OF EVERY E-MAIL, PHONE CALL, FAX AND TEXT MESSAGE

Brussels - Following agreement at last week's Justice and Home Affairs Council, E-communications service providers, through their trade associations, urge that the European Parliament extends the more balanced approach adopted with respect to traditional telephony services, and in particular on unsuccessful calls and mobile location data, to EU online services.

ECTA URGES GREATER ROLE FOR COMPETITION IN DELIVERING UNIVERSAL SERVICE

ECTA, the European Competitive Telecommunications Association, has called on the European Commission to thoroughly review its thinking on universal service to promote a more competition-driven approach to meeting consumer needs. In its response to the Commission's Review of the scope of universal service, ECTA suggests that, in future, if regulators put in place strong mechanisms to promote competition such as "access", we can move from the current situation, where the incumbent is expected to deliver universal service, to one where operators compete to offer a wide variety of voice and Internet services to consumers.