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Coffee Break DiscusssionOpening Session Kazumi Tanaka Fumiko Kimura, Shoji Morishima, Neil Anderson, Marcus Courtney

Is it time for online giants Google and Yahoo to chip in and help finance the expansion in high speed broadband that their downloads so voraciously consume? That was one of the questions raised at the UNI Telecom world meeting in Nyon, Switzerland that looked at the growing squeeze on telecom companies. Under pressure from regulators to restructure their services and offer competitors access to their networks - often at below cost - the established operators are losing revenue and uncertain profits from new investments. Competition has been the watch-word at the expense of investment. At stake are universal access to high-speed services and the jobs and conditions of communication workers across the world. It’s a growing crisis as the industry faces another big leap forward with next generation networks, convergence of telecom and broadcasting and the cost of buying new frequencies left vacant by the global phasing out of analogue television. “There is a tension between competition and investment and that’s critical for us,” Larry Cohen of the CWA in the US told delegates. “Because investment stops if there is too much focus on competition.” “Regulation that only promotes competition is not valid - how do you stimulate investment?” said UNI Telecom President Shoji Morishima. Unions are already playing a key role in tackling these changes. UNI Telecom has a “Telecoms for the long run” campaign and is pressing regulators and governments to ensure investment in modern, universal high-speed services - and ensure decent work.

In the United States the CWA persuaded the federal authorities to raise the defined minimum speed for broadband and launched a “Speed Matters” campaign to roll out high-speed networks across the United States.

Marcus Courtney, UNI’s new Head of Telecoms, reported on progress in the state legislature in Washington and public-private partnerships to build high speed access. “Washington State was in danger of falling behind the rest of the world in terms of speed.”

In the UK affiliate CWU campaigned hard to keep the network inside BT but as a semi autonomous Open Reach that has to share access with new competitors. The result has seen an explosion in broadband provision and growing services like TV downloads that use huge quantities of bandwidth. But, as competitors also offer telephony services, BT’s revenue is affected.

“There has been a huge increase in outsourcing,” reported the CWU’s Ian Cuthbert - along with threatened job losses.

In Ireland the CWU were successful in heading off a structural separation of functions in private equity owned Eircomm.



“We have to strike a balance that is consumer friendly and ensures profitability to provide investment,” said Hervé Morland of F3C-CFDT France.

“If you divide the service, investment will be reduced and there will be a fall in quality,” warned Kazumi Tanaka of NWJ Japan.

“The universal service has to be expanded and on a much more global basis,” said Juan Sierra of TCM-UGT. “We want high quality jobs and better access.”

Delegates warned that modern high-speed services might not reach people in rural areas if everything is left to competitors.

New telecom companies will concentrate on profit not investment, said Joe Chauke of CWU South Africa.