THE chairman of the Communications Commission says he is ‘obviously very disappointed’ that telecoms giant Cable & Wireless has launched legal proceedings against the regulator.
In a petition of doleance island-based Cable & Wireless Communications asks for a review of a decision by the Communications Commission not to investigate Manx Telecom for an alleged breach of the fair trading condition in MT’s licence.
CWC maintains that MT is charging customers substantially more to call CWC mobile customers than it charges them to call MT mobile customers –and that this acts to artificially dampen competition.
Andy Bridson, chief commercial officer of Cable & Wireless Channel Islands and Isle of Man, said: ‘This is the latest in a series of complaints by CWC relating to anti-competitive telecoms trading practices in the Isle of Man.
‘We have exhausted every avenue trying to resolve these issues by communicating with the Communications Commission and MT. Despite our very best efforts, the commission has refused to investigate this matter further, so regretfully we have no other choice but to take legal action.’
He added: ‘We recognise that the commission has recently issued a consultation on the mobile market, which also proposes a further consultation on mobile termination rates.
‘These consultations do not address the alleged breach by MT of the fair trading condition, which needs to be investigated urgently by the commission as we believe consumers and businesses are being disadvantaged as a result. CWC has made a substantial £30m investment in the Isle of Man over the past five years and continues to invest.
‘We want a level playing field in the Isle of Man to accelerate economic growth and diversification, while allowing islanders to benefit from the best services and pricing CWC can offer.’
Juan Watterson MHK, chairman of Communications Commission, said: ‘Obviously, we are very disappointed that Cable & Wireless has chosen to instigate legal proceedings especially when the Communications Commission is taking action on mobile phone charges and we are all agreed with the need to push ahead with reforms.’
Earlier this month, the telecoms regulator published proposals for consultation aimed at dramatically cutting the price paid by consumers for mobile phone calls by regulating for the first time mobile termination rates, the charges made by one network for receiving calls from another.
Additional reforms of the telecoms sector are proposed in a draft Communications Bill which will go out to consultation later this year.
Mr Watterson said progress on reform would ‘inevitably’ be slowed if the commission was having to fight legal battles. He said he believed that a lot of C&W’s concerns would be resolved by the proposed reforms – but in a different way than C&W was suggesting.
