At its 13th plenary meeting in St Julian’s, Malta, which took place on 6-7 December 2012, BEREC adopted three broadband common positions, following a period of public consultation. The common positions on wholesale local access, wholesale broadband access and wholesale leased lines, originally adopted in 2006 and 2007, were updated to reflect both technological developments (the roll-out of NGA networks) and regulatory developments (the revisions to the European regulatory framework in 2009, and the EU Commission’s NGA Recommendation).

During the Plenary, BEREC received a formal request from EU Vice-President Kroes for an opinion on the Commission’s draft Recommendation on issues of non-discrimination and costing methodologies. BEREC will provide an opinion by its first Plenary of 2013 (7-8 March 2013), and took the opportunity to reaffirm its commitment to continue to work closely with the Commission to provide the market with clear, coherent and predictable regulatory signals, recognising this is one of the necessary conditions for enabling investment in highspeed broadband networks in Europe.

During this last Plenary of 2012, BEREC also adopted its work programme for 2013, following a period of public consultation during the autumn. It also marked the completion of three years of work on the subject of net neutrality, adopting three new reports and publishing two high-level summaries of BEREC’s activities in this area over the last three years (all available here)

Looking ahead

In 2013, BEREC’s chair will be Leonidas Kanellos, president of Greek regulator, EETT. At its Plenary meeting, BEREC elected Luc Hindryckx, Chairman of the Council of Belgian regulator, BIPT, as its chair for 2014. New Vice-Chairs for 2013 were also elected, namely Franc Dolenc (Director of Slovenian regulator, APEK) and Gabor Matrai (Vice President for electronic communications, from Hungarian regulator, NMHH). The 2012 Chair of BEREC, Mr Georg Serentschy (CEO of Austrian regulator, RTR) will remain on the Board as a Vice Chair during 2013.

NOTE TO THE EDITOR:

BEREC is composed of a Board of Regulators consisting of the Heads of the 27 national regulatory authorities (NRAs). BEREC advises the European Commission and its member NRAs, and assists the European Parliament and Council, on issues related to the application of the EU regulatory framework for electronic communications. BEREC seeks to ensure fair competition and consistency of regulation in the internal market for electronic communications, for the benefit of European consumers. In particular, it provides expert advice on market definitions, analysis and remedies, on the definition of transnational markets, and on cross-border disputes and numbering issues. BEREC also provides expert opinions on emerging challenges including the promotion of broadband, net neutrality and converging markets, and plays an active role in public discussions on these issues.

For more information:

[email protected]

tel. +371 6611 7590