Information society : agenda for action in the UK : evidence received after 31 March 1996 / Select Committee on Science and Technology.
- Great Britain. Parliament. House of Lords. Science and Technology Committee.
- Date:
- 1996
Licence: Open Government Licence
Credit: Information society : agenda for action in the UK : evidence received after 31 March 1996 / Select Committee on Science and Technology. Source: Wellcome Collection.
181/324 (page 483)
![4 June 1996] [Continued Chairman contd.] we have done a lot of work on this recently—and it is the bandwidth or speed of access to those customers in giving them these services. This will become increasingly important in the future and it is not just focused at the access level, it will also be focused back into the core trunk network where you need sufficient capacity to deliver these services. This is really looking at the developments and interaction of core services and also, if you like, high detailed graphics when you are down-loading to the customer. What we have to face and answer is how we get this access to the customer, so we can serve these customers with high bandwidth applications, and it really is looking at the access. How is it best done? How do you “incent” the providers to give this access? Under the Government’s policy of infrastructure competition, which is promoting this, you will see there is an incentive to produce high bandwidth access to the customer. Mercury’s opening statement welcomes and supports the policy of infrastructure competition and how it will enable us to be capable of providing services consumers want in the future. Baroness Hogg 864. Would you like to up-date your evidence to take account of the developments since you submitted it in the regulatory area? Is Mercury satisfied with the present regulatory and pricing structures in telecommunications? I am thinking in particular of the recent statement from Oftel. (Mr Weston) Yes, we were very pleased indeed to see the DG decide to rule as he did on the price cap. One of the concerns we had with the continuation of the broad cap, set between 5 and 9 as it was first proposed, was that it would not allow us or enable us to carry on investing in infrastructure, and we went to present to both the DTI and Oftel on this, principally on wireless local loop, a new technology, which we would not be able to use to serve more customers and areas in the UK. Beyond that, it is wire line access, rolling out fibre optics to specific areas in the UK where the economics justify it. So we are very pleased to see a structure has been put in place to support that. Another area we were particularly pleased with as well was the proposals for prohibition of anti-competitive practices which the Director General put in place. Although we would like to see primary legislation for this kind of abuse of market power we support what the DG has done. We did have concerns about the appeal process but he has gone a long way in mentioning he would like to expand the use of an expert panel, and that has helped a lot. It brings into the public eye the thought process behind the decisions he makes, and really allows us to take advantage of the avenue of judicial review for overturning various decisions or challenging them should that be necessary. One or two other things which spring to mind on the regulatory front are, number one, number portability, and that is very important especially when you are looking at local operators like cable operators, so they can bring on more customers; the ability of the customer to be able to keep his number. So we were very pleased to see that. Another area we are a little concerned about is the European Union. We have to be sure that what is being proposed by the European Union is being supported or realised in what Oftel are saying, and there is an increasing amount of need for consistency between the two. 865. What are your points of particular concern on the inconsistency? (Mr Weston) At the moment we are not sure what will be the impact of the Council’s Directive on Interconnect. We need more clarity on that. I know a draft Interconnect directive was issued on 20th May and we are still analysing that, but it is not clear to us at the moment exactly what the repercussions of that will be. 866. Are you looking for primary legislation in terms of general competition policy legislation or specific to telecommunications on the abuse of the market? (Mr Weston) With regard to Mercury, it would be primarily for telecommunications but it would be extended, I would imagine as primary legislation, to general anti-competitive practices in primary legislation. Lord Flowers 867. You say in your written evidence to us, “Although there has been extensive debate on information superhighways and ...” such like, “... the UK remains a long way from finding answers to the questions involved. This will continue to be the case while debate focuses on infrastructure instead of applications and services.” I wondered whether you would like to extemporise on that theme a little and make some remarks possibly about whether or not there should be a distinction made between the network sector and the service sector? (Mr Weston) The idea of focusing on the infrastructure is something we have looked at in great detail recently to try and get services to our customers. We do say that there are limitations at the moment to the Information Superhighway, but we do also realise the Internet is that; everyone who has a computer and a telephone line, as the gentleman from QVC pointed out, has access to the Internet. So that, if you like, is the genesis of it. We would like to see when you start to look at providing Information Superhighway-type products and services it does not just focus on the Internet, that there is the ability to offer other services beyond that. The question then is the type of access you need to be able to provide those services, so broad band infrastructure at the local loop and indeed the trunk network level. When we come to look at splitting a company like Mercury or BT into two areas, one to provide network-type services, and two, service providers, we then begin to question the ability of the incentive for the network service providers to invest in the type of technology they would require to provide the type of access they need. We also need to look at the way it is implemented in the market; there has to be co- ordination between the largest operators in the UK market—BT and Mercury—because you cannot have one doing it without the other doing it. Our conclusion from looking at it would be that we would not support splitting the companies, or indeed the](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b32218631_0181.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
