The Barcelona Summit’s re-affirmation of the EU’s two-year old Lisbon Agenda was an important political signal, but where in practical terms does the e-Europe strategy now stand? How can Europe’s governments and EU policymakers kick-start both investment and demand from interactive communications and e-Commerce? What can be done to accelerate the development of broadband, and how can content providers be spanned into creating new and better services for it?
Featuring:
Robert Verrue, EC Director General for Information Society and Hans Willi Hefekäuser, Senior Executive Vice President Government Affairs, Deutsche Telekom.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Summary of Debates ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Uniform application of the EU’s new package of telecom laws and avoidance of heavy-handed regulation are the keys to translating the 15 member states’ e-Europe aspirations into reality by 2010, say EU and European telecoms industry officials. National regulators must keep their eyes on the ultimate goal—creation of level, competitive conditions across the EU—if Europe’s Information Society goals are not to fail, they warn.
Meeting here under auspices of Friends of Europe for an evening debate on 29 April entitled, “Is e-Europe Still a Distant Dream”, policy specialists and representatives from Europe’s telecoms industry exchanged views with two experts well versed in the challenges of e-Europe: Robert Verrue, outgoing head of the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Information Society, and Hans Willi Hefekauser, senior vice president for government affairs at Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s largest telecoms group.
Debate centered on the eventual effects of the EU’s package of telecom directives, which took effect on 24 April and is due to implemented at national level by July 2003. Noting that the package boils the EU’s former hodge-podge of 20 telecoms directives down to five measures, Verrue said “this is already a positive step toward less regulation.”
But more than deregulation of the sector is needed, he said. “Efficacy is the critical challenge before us. If the EU fails to create a level playing field, if competition conditions are not more harmonious and consistent across borders, we will fail. More diversified services and lower prices will not materialise.”
Hefekauser insisted on industry’s need for a light, predictable and market-driven regulatory framework. “Regulation should be kept to a minimum,” he said.
Referring to the increasingly rapid convergence between different communications technologies or platforms, he noted that regulators “must focus on promoting inter-platform competition. The US is doing this and so should Europe so that we can compete effectively with US firms and especially with the emerging industry giants of Japan and China.”
Moderator Michael Bartholomew, director of the European Telecommunications Network Operators’ Association, asked if national regulatory authorities (NRAs) could be expected to interpret the EU’s telecom package in coherent fashion.
Verrue said there were a pair of good reasons for optimism. “First, the NRAs fully recognise that, despite two years of effort [since the EU’s last round of telecom directives], there is no level playing field in telecommunications. So they know this must change,” he observed.
“Second, they will meet on a regular basis—every six weeks or so—within the European Regulators’ Group. Although it has no regulatory mandate, this group’s regular exchanges of views and information will go far toward minimising divergent interpretations of the new rules by national authorities,” he concluded.
By Brooks Tigner, ETNO