Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-10-25-Speech-3-343"
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"en.20001025.15.3-343"2
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"Commissioner, Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, behind the somewhat barbaric name of the proposal for a regulation which we are debating this evening, unbundling access to the local loop, an expression moreover which is totally impenetrable for the average citizen, there lies a simple yet serious decision regarding the liberalisation of the local network of voice telephony and data transmission services.
As we have heard this evening, for some in this House, the closing of the final chapter of a public monopoly can only lead to an automatic reduction in the costs of local communications and this can therefore only be positive for consumers.
For others, including me, this is far from being quite so obvious and, above all, quite so automatic. If unregulated competition always leads to a permanent reduction in prices, and always benefits each and every consumer everywhere, this would have happened long ago. Moreover, the example of mobile telephony, which is completely open to competition, proves precisely the opposite. Real prices of calls from mobiles continue to be high and the transparency of costs and prices is far from being guaranteed. Between the hype and the reality there is not a divide but a chasm. Many citizens have fallen victim to this and are unable to pay their bill, and resort to declaring their mobile stolen.
Nevertheless, I approve of unbundling, but simple, clear constraints need to be worked out in this area as well in order to define the limits, follow progress and lay down terms for the financing of the universal service.
Our rapporteur and colleague, Mr Nicholas Clegg, has certainly done a lot of work, and I congratulate him on that. He has even been open to the arguments of his colleagues, and I thank him for that. But he is very liberal and so he has naturally rejected anything that could lead to a genuine universal service. He is more afraid of public monopolies than private monopolies. I hope, therefore, that the framework directive entitled ‘A Universal Service’, for which I was appointed rapporteur in July of last year on behalf of the Committee on Industry, External Trade, Research and Energy, and which I now have to salvage despite the attempts of the Committee on Legal Affairs and the Internal Market, will enable us to redress the balance to some extent.
Mr Clegg has correctly and very seriously set forth the Commission's proposal on unbundling from a technical standpoint. But I am sorry to say that, as I see it, he has not adequately responded to the longer term risk posed for the weaker and the more susceptible players in a deregulated system, and to the risk posed by private monopolies.
This evening, I repeat once again that, for me, a public service must not be a sink for the market. It must be, and it can be, an objective in itself and, for us Europeans, a value and an asset for balanced and sustainable development. All things considered, Madam President, as the three European institutions are in agreement on uncoupling, I will not be more catholic than the Pope, and I shall therefore be voting in favour tomorrow."@en1
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