[AusNOG] Comms Day on reviews of the Telecoms Act

Tue Feb 18 18:39:31 EST 2014

Sure, I more meant why is the speculation about the ACCC exiting its
regulatory function over the telecommunications industry instead of ACMA,
who have arguably a much less useful role to play than the ACCC.

On Tue, Feb 18, 2014 at 5:01 PM, Catchall <support at twig.com.au> wrote:

>  ACMA is definitely needed for the "other" areas of its interest/control,
> namely radio..  Without our airwaves would be rife with interference..
>
> ACCC is needed for its "other" areas of interest/control, like stopping
> monopolies stangle hard working small businesses.
>
> Not all areas of interest/control are useless in these bodies.. But
> perhaps the lines of crossover are too blurred which makes seeing effective
> working practices hard to see...
>
>
> Mal (VK2XFW)
>
>
>  *TWIG Solutions*
>  *Your Mobile Technology Partner.*
> *E-mail:* sales at twig.com.au   *Phone:* 02 8004 2000
>  *Supplier of the Bitdefender Security Solutions.*
>
>  On 18/02/2014 4:46 PM, Geordie Guy wrote:
>
> Why don't we keep the ACCC and get rid of ACMA?
>
>
> On Tue, Feb 18, 2014 at 1:01 PM, Narelle <narellec at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>  Opinion in CommsDay today comes out swinging against the ACCC and some
>> of the pillars of Australia's competition regulation. "[T]he time may have
>> come for the ACCC to vacate its role as the de facto comptroller and
>> consigliere for the Australian telecommunications industry".
>>
>>
>>  What would this mean for ACMA? Comms Day may be reading the govt
>> correctly, they may be not.
>>
>>
>>  Thoughts?
>>
>>
>>  Narelle
>>
>>
>>
>>  From Comms Day today
>>
>>
>>
>> COMMENT BY GRAHAME LYNCH
>>
>>
>>
>> *Is a new 2014 Telecommunications Act in the offing?*
>>
>>
>>
>> Is the Federal government gearing up for the most far-reaching overhaul
>> of telecommunications legislation
>>
>> and regulation in seventeen years--in effect, a new 2014
>> Telecommunications Act that replaces
>>
>> the 1997 act and the telecommunications sections of trade practices
>> legislation?
>>
>>
>>
>> That's certainly the implication of the messaging coming out of Canberra
>> over the past few days.
>>
>> EXHIBIT A: Parliamentary secretary Paul Fletcher told parliament last
>> week "the current regulatory
>>
>> framework is fundamentally based on a 1990s world of relatively stable
>> technologies and business
>>
>> models which placed great emphasis on the predominance of the fixed-line
>> network--which was certainly
>>
>> a valid assumption at the time. Since that time, of course, there has
>> been a steady accretion of
>>
>> layer upon layer of rules and regulations. Some of these rules and
>> regulations are important for facilitating
>>
>> competition but others are not of such evident value in 2014. It is
>> timely to ask whether the
>>
>> policy objectives underpinning particular regulatory measures in the
>> communications sector remain
>>
>> valid; if they do not, the case for those regulations being retained is
>> very difficult to see."
>>
>>
>>
>> EXHIBIT B: The "framing" paper for the NBN cost-benefit review released
>> last Thursday night reads
>>
>> less like a slight calibration of the status quo and more like the type
>> of paper one would release if one
>>
>> was contemplating a complete "re-boot" of the entire policy and
>> legislative assumptions that underpin
>>
>> the Australian telecommunications sector. It states that "Australia is
>> unusual in vesting responsibility
>>
>> for economic regulation of telecommunications in a generalist body whose
>> responsibilities include
>>
>> administration of the competition laws."
>>
>>
>>
>> "Originally, the decision to transfer those powers to the ACCC was based
>> on the view that telecommunications- specific provisions would merge over
>> time into the national access regime established under Part IIIA of then
>> Trade Practices Act. However, no such confluence has occurred nor
>>
>> seems likely to occur, though it may well be that some aspects of the
>> current telecommunications provisions will eventually be substantially
>> streamlined. In the light of those considerations, and of the
>>
>> broader factors determining the efficient allocation of functions in a
>> regulatory system, the panel
>>
>> would welcome views on whether the current allocation of responsibilities
>> should remain or alternatively,
>>
>> what alternative approach would be preferable."
>>
>>
>>
>> EXHIBIT C: The same framing paper invites a complete "re-think" on the
>> assumptions underlying
>>
>> the NBN policy, which, of course, was the end-point of the open access
>> debate and policy evolution
>>
>> that began in earnest as long ago as 2001 and accelerated in 2005 under
>> Telstra's plea for regulatory
>>
>> relief so it could build an FTTN network. Among the issues on the table:
>> should the NBN refrain
>>
>> from overbuild of privately held networks that can achieve NBN-level
>> functionalities, should retail
>>
>> service providers be able to buy equity in NBN Co, how should
>> cross-subsidies for loss making services
>>
>> be best provided and most significantly, "What broader structural model
>> or models for the industry
>>
>> should the panel consider"?
>>
>>
>>
>> The corridors of power now host alternative intellectual viewpoints to
>> the access seeker-driven
>>
>> "victim mentality" agenda that has dominated Australian telecom policy
>> for a decade.
>>
>> The failure of the ACCC to adopt a consistent regulatory approach that
>> would provide predictability
>>
>> and certainty for telecommunications network investors has been well
>> catalogued, especially in this
>>
>> journal, but the regulator persists, oblivious to criticism. Now
>> taxpayers are potentially exposed to upwards of tens of billions of dollars
>> of liability simply so that My Little ISP Pty Ltd can theoretically
>>
>> play in the same league as Telstra and SingTel.
>>
>>
>>
>> From 2002 or so, the ACCC acted as if making access seekers more reliant
>> on below-cost access to
>>
>> Telstra's network would somehow reduce Telstra's dominance, seemingly
>> blind to the obvious endpoint
>>
>> that the investment impasse this spawned provided limited short term
>> benefits to some citizens
>>
>> as consumers (the million or two who took a slightly cheaper
>> Telstra-sourced, access-seeker resold
>>
>> broadband service in urban areas) and a medium to long term cost to all
>> citizens as taxpayers (who are
>>
>> exposed to the risk of the 100% government subsidised NBN and are
>> compelled to out lay tens of billions of dollars of compensation to big bad
>> Telstra).
>>
>>
>>
>> On one hand we had the ACCC denying that it priced access too low, even
>> when at the same time
>>
>> its own explanatory documents were affirming that it employed pricing
>> methodologies such as "retail minus' on already price capped retail
>> services precisely because they delivered the lowest price outcome.
>>
>>
>>
>> At the same time, it constantly shifted the methodology goal posts,
>> repeatedly deferring costs to
>>
>> a future which would never arrive: a so-called "tilted annuity" designed
>> to reward access seekers with
>>
>> short term prices well below their sustainable cost. A decade on, the
>> ACCC's cost models even now
>>
>> only allow Telstra to recover costs at a monthly rate of between $16 (ULL
>> Band 2) and $24 (ADSL
>>
>> Wholesale) per line when the copper network's actual replacement network
>> in the form of the NBN
>>
>> has estimated it needed to earn $32 by as soon as next year and above $50
>> within five years to meet
>>
>> its own (likely over optimistic in itself) business plan.
>>
>>
>>
>> This ongoing intellectual fraud persisted because of a policy environment
>> where a spectacularly
>>
>> well-organised and articulate access seeker lobby successfully equated
>> their own interests with the
>>
>> "public interest" and created a sense of constant crisis about the
>> regulatory regime and Telstra's
>>
>> "dominance." Concerns over Telstra's dominance and likely behaviour under
>> privatisation also led to
>>
>> a succession of regulations governing its service and connection levels,
>> at a potential cost of a billion
>>
>> or more dollars relative to benefits.
>>
>>
>>
>> The fact that the vast majority of Telstra access seekers and ISPs whose
>> business formation was inspired by the 1997 reforms have sold out or merged
>> for collective hundreds of millions of dollars in
>>
>> shareholder return--nearly 20 such entities bought by iiNet
>> alone--demonstrates how over-egged this
>>
>> sense of perpetual grievance and crisis was. Ditto, the nationalisation
>> of fixed network capital investment
>>
>> and deal to provide tens of billions of dollars of NBN compensation to
>> Telstra has correlated
>>
>> with a near doubling of Telstra's share price since 2010. So much for
>> crimping the 600 pound gorilla.
>>
>> As Malcolm Turnbull memorably described it, one senses a conspiracy
>> against the taxpayer.
>>
>>
>>
>> 1997 ASSUMPTIONS CHANGE: Indeed, developments over the last 17 years have
>> left behind the
>>
>> best intentions of the 1997 Telecommunications Act. One obvious change
>> was the rise of broadband,
>>
>> fuelled by the emergence of cheap Chinese-made DSLAMs, and the sea change
>> this created in the
>>
>> layers where value is created over telecommunications networks--that is,
>> not just through end user
>>
>> access charges, but through over-the-top services and serving facilities
>> in data centres.
>>
>>
>>
>> Another was the rise of mobile tech to dominance and its ability to offer
>> substitutes to almost every
>>
>> monetisable service hitherto monopolised by the fixed network. Stephen
>> Conroy, his advisers, bureaucrats
>>
>> and industry supporters, were unfortunately so blindsided by fixed access
>> seeker and then
>>
>> FTTH lobby rhetoric that they failed to react to these developments,
>> committing ever more public
>>
>> policy attention and resource to the apparently vexing but increasingly
>> receding priority of vertical
>>
>> integration and retail dominance in the fixed network access market.
>>
>>
>>
>> Now the writing is on the wall for these decade-old homilies. The new
>> government appears determined
>>
>> to deliver on red tape reduction in a way its predecessors under Rudd,
>> Gillard and Howard
>>
>> did not--and the vast, unwieldy pot-pourri of 20th century
>> telecommunications legislation seems ripe
>>
>> for dismantling. One of the chief dissenters from the received wisdom
>> over the past decade, Professor
>>
>> Henry Ergas, now sits on the panel charged with providing primary advice
>> to government on what
>>
>> new approach it should adopt, alongside some interesting characters such
>> as Alison Deans, who, as a
>>
>> former Ebay executive, presumably brings a nuanced view of the interplay
>> between OTT, access, fixed
>>
>> and mobile in the telecommunications ecosystem.
>>
>>
>>
>> The new panel has already overtly signalled that the time may have come
>> for the ACCC to vacate
>>
>> its role as the de facto comptroller and consigliere for the Australian
>> telecommunications industry.
>>
>> Almost certainly the emphasis will be on compelling telecom operators--and
>> the private sector more
>>
>> generally--to take on more of the risk, heavy lifting and reward in
>> building and delivering next generation
>>
>> services. Lest this be seen as a fool's errand it should be revealed that
>> Telstra CEO David Thodey
>>
>> and a representative of Optus' ultimate owner Temasek are meeting with
>> Federal Treasurer Joe Hockey
>>
>> later this week to discuss how to unlock private sector capital for
>> infrastructure investment. Legislative
>>
>> and regulatory incentives--and disincentives- will almost certainly be a
>> topic for discussion.
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>>
>> Narelle Clark
>> president at isoc-au.org.au
>> narellec at gmail.com
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> AusNOG mailing list
>> AusNOG at lists.ausnog.net
>> http://lists.ausnog.net/mailman/listinfo/ausnog
>>
>>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> AusNOG mailing listAusNOG at lists.ausnog.nethttp://lists.ausnog.net/mailman/listinfo/ausnog
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> AusNOG mailing list
> AusNOG at lists.ausnog.net
> http://lists.ausnog.net/mailman/listinfo/ausnog
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ausnog.net/pipermail/ausnog/attachments/20140218/050d05de/attachment-0001.html>