Brussels, 06/07/2006 (Agence Europe) - In a speech last week in Brussels before the EVUA (Enterprise Virtual Private Networks Users Association), Viviane Reding, Commissioner on the information society and the media, restated her intention to regulate the roaming market, as telecom operators had not put forward tariffs that were felt to be justified for the consumer. The industry is also penalised as the cost of roaming represents a large part in companies' overheads, Ms Reding recalled, recommending “a true European home market for roaming customers”. Although this initiative angers operators who threaten to offset their losses by stepping up the price of other services, national regulators are in favour of Community intervention on the wholesale market, considering it is impossible to intervene effectively on the retail market. This point of view is shared by the Commissioner who said “Reductions in wholesale charges are often not passed through to the retail customer. I believe therefore that the forthcoming EU regulation needs to address both the wholesale and the retail level. Imposing regulation at wholesale level only would remedy the problem of high charges between operators but would not guarantee that lower wholesale prices would be passed through to retail customers”.
The College of Commissioners is to give its stance on the Commission's proposal, probably by 19 July. According to The Financial Times, Commissioners Günter Verheugen (industry) and Peter Mandelson (trade) are sceptical about how appropriate such regulation would be. The former believes the problem would lie more in the way Ms Reding foresees market regulation rather than in the fully justified intention to reduce the cost of roaming, while the latter fears intervention would be detrimental to the market's competitive development.