News

According to the IDG News report, the 27 telecommunication ministers of the European Union unanimously dismissed Commissioner Viviane Reding's plans to create a powerful central telecom regulatory body at a meeting in Luxembourg on June 12. Commissioner's latest idea to issue guidelines for the telecom industry on ensuring a fair return on investment and sharing of next-generation telecom infrastructure was not backed up by the ministers as well.



Nevertheless, the ministers supported other elements of Reding's reform plans, such as the functional separation. The Commission believes that functional separation of telecom companies' infrastructure from their own telecom services is a necessary threat to make to incumbent operators because many of them are still failing to grant fair access to their networks.

Reding's vision of a single European regulator was laid down last year in her proposals for reforming Europe's telecom laws. Initially, her plan was presented as a European equivalent of the powerful US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and was a central plank in her reform package. It would combine the roles of ENISA, the European network security agency, with an overview of the telecom market in one supra-national body. However, hostility to the plan has grown, especially among national telecom authorities, which would have been eclipsed by the new central body if it were created.