Debate on Scrutiny of European Commission&rsquo;s implementing power; "Fair use" of roaming services, presentation by Commission of draft implementing act, at the&nbsp;Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE), in the EP in Brussels. Statements by Roberto VIOLA, Director General of DG Connect (EC), Vicky FORD (ECR, UK), Pilar del CASTILLO VERA (EPP, ES), Patrizia TOIA (S&amp;D, IT), and Dan NICA (S&amp;D, RO).

Brussels

Committee on Industry, Research and Energy

debate

meeting

del CASTILLO VERA, Pilar (EPP, ES)

roaming (T)

TOIA, Patrizia (S&D, IT)

NICA, Dan (S&D, RO)

Scrutiny of European Commission’s implementing power; "Fair use" of roaming services, presentation by Commission of draft implementing act: extracts from the debate

Title: Scrutiny of European Commission&apos;s implementing power: &apos;&apos;Fair use&apos;&apos; of roaming services, presentation by Commission of draft implementing act

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberto VIOLA , Director General of DG Connect (EC), What needs to be done to adopt the implementing act? So the draft that we send today to Parliament and Council needs to receive the opinion of the regulators, of BEREC. And BEREC needs to deliver the opinion by 15 October. And then it goes to examination to CoCom. So to the member states who take their vote on 23 November. The Commission is supposed to approve the final implementing act by 15 December.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberto VIOLA, Director General of DG Connect (EC), The normal average citizen has nothing to do. Simply will have Roam like at Home activated and doesn&rsquo;t need to worry. We have allowed operators to check for extreme cases, individual checks which are low activity with roaming traffic so SIM cards which make no traffic during the year or insignificant traffic in the country of residence and all the rest being roaming or subscription by a single subscriber or many many different themes. And also we have allowed operators to check if someone is reselling those cards in another member state for commercial purposes.

SOUNDBITE (English), Vicky FORD (ECR, UK), I fully support the concept of Roam like at Home but I am concerned that this proposal is not as simple as it could be and could lead to additional confusion and especially we could get different implementation in different member states.

SOUNDBITE (English), Vicky FORD (ECR, UK), My concern is yes we must make sure that lower end consumers don&rsquo;t end up subsidising high end consumers.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), Pilar del CASTILLO VERA (EPP, ES), The part that could be more difficult to understand I think is actually to do with the supervisory aspect of the reasonable use clause the fair use clause. What I would say because I have only had a chance to glance at it is to make sure that we take into account the possibility of a mechanism to observe abusive behaviour if it takes place in all the various scenarios and if it happens amongst the operators that the information can be passed on and that the subscribers can respond before they are sanctioned before they are fined.

SOUNDBITE (Italian), Patrizia TOIA (S&amp;D, IT), If it becomes clear that this ceiling for people living in one country and travelling. If it becomes clear that the traffic is suspect in some way or another, what procedure will be followed to block abuse?

SOUNDBITE (Romanian), Dan NICA (S&amp;D, RO), How do you guarantee that noone will go beyond what the decision says on the one hand that the consumers who are acting in good faith would enjoy low tariffs and the operators who might not act in good faith and will try to cheat will be penalised? This is the crux of the matter.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberto VIOLA, Director General of DG Connect (EC), Now in the event something strange happens for instance long term displacement or whatever he will get an SMS so Roam like at Home continues. The implementing act says that he can complain to the operator. If the operator does not answer and he has to answer then he can go to the regulator to settle the case. So he or she will not get disconnected but will be alerted that the system has detected an anomalous use of Roam like at Home.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberto VIOLA, Director General of DG Connect (EC), There&rsquo;s another case where the operator discovers an organised business that is illegal. So hundreds, thousands of SIM cards being resold abroad. Then in this case those cards can be suspended but the regulator has to be immediately informed - it&rsquo;s like the interconnection system when those cases happen - and then the regulator has to make a final decision.