In a speech made to the European Regulators Group (ERG) in Paris on 8 Feb 2006, the EC Commissioner for Information Society and Media, Viviane Reding, announced that she had ‘asked the European Commission services’…

‘to start working on an EU regulation on international roaming charges � an EU Regulation that the European Commission could propose to the European Parliament and the Council well before the summer break.’

This is clearly a very major development, in terms of its substance as well as regarding the choice of regulatory instrument.

Indeed, in roughly 20 years of the European Commission’s active involvement in telecommunications legislation/regulation in the European Union, there has been only one previous instance in which the instrument of a Regulation (which is directly binding on companies in all Member States, as opposed to Directives which must first be transposed into national law) has been used. The previous instance was Regulation 2887/2000 which mandated local loop unbundling throughout the EU as of 1/1/2001.

Ms Reding’s speech also contained important messages and suggestions concerning the European Commission’s approach to the 2006 Reviews (of the Recommendation on Relevant Markets Susceptible to Ex-Ante Regulation, and especially the upcoming review of EU directives on electronic communications).

The most notable message concerns the veto powers of the European Commission over decisions of National Regulatory Authorities (which, under the current regulatory framework, apply to market definition and assessment of Significant Market Power, but not to the selection of ‘remedies’, i.e. regulatory obligations). Ms Reding stated the following in this regard:

‘When we come to review the regulatory framework in 2006, we may agree that there is no need for increasing the Commission powers substantially, but there is room for improvement in getting regulators to think beyond their national boundaries. As we go forward, I would ask for your support on using the ERG, not just as a source of regulatory expertise for its members, but also for the purpose of delivering more of a genuine internal market than has been the case to date, for example by seeking more consistency in the imposition of remedies’.

Further notable statements included the following:

‘In the internet world, we see that the challenges to the market leader do not come from large, established companies with a legacy network. Today�s challengers are yesterday�s start-ups, which have then succeeded and become new established companies. This has been the case for Yahoo, Netscape, and more recently Google and Skype. I call on all of us to see this development, and the arrival of new innovative companies also from outside Europe not as a threat, but as a welcome wake-up call for Europe�s industry and policy-makers’.

The full text of Ms Reding’s speech to the ERG members can be accessed by clicking here.