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Play it again, Andrus

EPA

Play it again, Andrus

Telecoms single market regulations for net neutrality and mobile roaming charges keep on keeping on.

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Attempts to reach consensus between the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission on the struggling telecoms single market package are reaching a fever pitch, with a stream of compromise proposals changing hands by all sides.

According to the latest draft of the regulations updated May 22, seen by POLITICO, the negotiation process has stripped the package of most of its original measures, leaving just mobile roaming and net neutrality, or open Internet access, on the table.

Andrus Ansip, the Commission’s vice president for the digital single market, has been open about his frustration.

“The level of ambition is really low,” said Ansip at a digital single market event earlier this month.

With the Latvian presidency keen to wrap up before handing leadership over to Luxembourg in July, Parliament in-fighting and the Council battered with criticism from all sides, the rules are still in flux.

Net neutrality

The controversial net neutrality provisions, which have been subject to intense debate both within and between Parliament and the Council, continue to evolve.

POLITICO has previously reported that a definition of net neutrality had been removed, with those in favor of that move arguing that being too explicit could create loopholes. The deletion remains.

Traffic management, the ability of providers to slow Internet access during peak periods, has been hotly contested.

The draft regulations allow “reasonable traffic management,” which is transparent, non-discriminatory, proportionate, not anti-competitive, and “based on objectively different technical quality of service requirements of specific categories or classes of traffic.”

Internet service providers (ISPs) will be able to differentiate between types of traffic, for example video content versus email, but not on the basis of commercial considerations.

Many on the left, including members of parliament in the Socialists & Democrats, Greens and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, back a strict approach that bans traffic management altogether. Parliament’s right wingers want to allow it.

In what will be music to the ears of UK MEPs from the European Conservatives and Reformists group, parental control measures that allow users to opt in to ISP-based adult content filters are in the current draft.

But not everyone in Parliament will be pleased, so prepare for push-back from the left.

The draft takes a middle-of-the-road approach to telecoms sequestering parts of their network for specialized services, such as for connected cars. It’s not explicitly banned, as operators feared, but will only be allowed if network capacity is sufficient so as not to be to the “detriment of the availability or quality of Internet access services for other end-users.”

The big telecoms operators, who have been lobbying hard on this issue, will see this as too restrictive.

Roaming

The roaming provisions have been divisive.

With the Parliament and Commission wanting to keep their promises to ban roaming charges and the Council sensitive to concern from their local telecoms companies, both sides have dug in their heels.

Timing has been a major stumbling block. Parliament wants a ban in 2016, but the Council has managed to delay it to 2018 (at least for now).

There will be a two-year transition period starting in 2016 where consumers will receive 40 minutes of incoming and outgoing calls, 40 text messages and 80 megabytes of data per calendar year.

This contrasts to the original proposal of five minutes, five texts and 10 megabytes, but is nowhere near the 100, 100, 200 that Parliament wants.

Users will be able to choose a roaming deal separate from those provided in the transition period — for example, choosing to pay a flat daily rate for roaming.

Once the ban is implemented, a fair use policy will apply, meaning consumers in Germany, for example, won’t be able to pick up a phone plan in cheaper Finland and surf to their heart’s content back home.

Telecoms operators around the EU have objected to the roaming surcharge ban. They say there’s an imbalance: Scandinavian companies, for example, find more of their customers heading to sunnier destinations abroad and fewer tourists incoming. This, they say, will mean uneven costs for telecoms depending on where their customers live.

“The underlying costs of roaming [need to be] addressed at the same time as we think about the retail,” said Phillip Malloch, head of group public affairs with telecoms company TeliaSonera. “Wholesale and retail considerations need to go hand-in-hand for this regulation to be effective in the long term.”

The proposed draft states that wholesale pricing of roaming will be reviewed, with the Commission submitting proposed legislation to set maximum wholesale roaming charges or another solution to Parliament by December 15, 2017.

Authors:
Zoya Sheftalovich