The Council held a public exchange of views on the review of the EU regulatory framework and took note of the presidency's three progress reports on the work carried out so far in its preparatory bodies. (See also COD/2007/0248 and COD/2007/0249). The Commission's telecoms reform package aims to enable citizens, wherever they live and wherever they travel in the EU, to benefit from better and cheaper communication services.
The Ministers' debate focused in particular on the proposal on better regulation, namely the consistent application of the regulatory framework in the internal market and the management of the radio spectrum in the EU. The discussions provided political guidance for further work on these proposals that will continue under the French presidency.
This Commission’s proposal aims to amend the regulatory framework for electronic communications by improving its effectiveness, reducing the administrative resources needed to implement economic regulation and making access to radio frequencies simpler and more efficient.
During the discussions in the Council's bodies, delegations supported a number of objectives put forward in this proposal, such as the need to ensure consistent application in Member States of the regulatory framework for electronic communications and the need to ensure flexible and efficient use of the radio spectrum. However, they have some doubts about the proposed measures to achieve those objectives, about the proposed procedures to achieve harmonisation and about the level of detail of such harmonisation. In addition, Member States are concerned that the proposals could disturb the current balance of proportionality and subsidiarity and that a number of provisions would considerably add to the administrative burden.
The Presidency’s progress report also identifies the main issues that will need to be addressed further, in particular: radio spectrum, article 7 procedures and remedies, and implementation issues.