A SURVEY of telecoms regulation in Europe has ranked Ireland sixth out of 22 nations but “but is generally weaker on the resulting regulatory and market outcomes”.
Alto, the representative body for alternative operators, says the report shows Ireland’s failings and the only way to tackle Eircom’s dominance of the market is to break it into retail and wholesale businesses.
The 2010 Regulatory Scorecard produced by European Competitive Telecommunications Association (Ecta) gives Ireland a score of 317 out of 400 placing it behind the Netherlands, Norway, the UK, France and Denmark.
“We are urging that the new EU communications framework be transposed into law immediately and that ComReg uses the power it grants to functionally separate Eircom,” said Ronan Lupton, chairman of Alto, Ireland’s member of Ecta.
Mr Lupton said the report, which will be published on Monday, demonstrates that while the Government and telecoms regulator ComReg has tried a range of remedies to open up the market to alternative operators, these have failed.
For example, the Ecta report shows the cost of local loop unbundling, where another operator takes over an Eircom line to provide its own services, is the highest in Europe at €432 for two years in Ireland, compared to €134 in Poland. It also notes that for fixed line telephone calls in Ireland, “competition . . . remains limited and prices are high”.
The report notes that in a number of categories, most notably the application of European regulations, ComReg is one of the “best practice” regulators.
Mr Lupton said a functional separation of Eircom into two businesses was the only way his members would gain an insight into what services Eircom’s retail division was getting from its wholesale arm.
“All we have is bundles which are outdated,” said Mr Lupton. “Our members can’t run their businesses properly unless they know what is going into the Eircom products.”
Alto has begun lobbying the Government to implement the breaking up of Eircom.
Mr Lupton said his organisation had no preference as to whether Eircom’s retail division would be sold off or remain in the former State telco’s ownership.
“The problem is that access to the market is still dominated by Eircom,” he said. “It’s the same old story.”
The Ecta scorecard also highlights how the competitiveness of multinational European firms is being undermined by the variations in regulation, which push up the cost of building networks across Europe.
