A4-0306/95

Resolution concerning the draft Commission Directive amending Directive 90/388/EEC with regard to mobile and personal communications (SEC(95)1382 - C4-0364/95)

The European Parliament,

-having regard to the draft Commission Directive amending Directive 90/388/EEC with regard to mobile and personal communications (SEC(95)1382 -C4-0364/95),

-having regard to Article 90 of the EC Treaty,

-having regard to its resolutions of 7 April and 19 May 1995 on the Commission's Green Paper on the liberalization of telecommunications infrastructure and cable television networks and its resolution of 19 May 1995 on the Commission communication to the European Parliament and the Council entitled 'Towards the personal communications environment: Green Paper on a common approach in the field of mobile and personal communications in the European Union' and on the Commission communication to the European Parliament and the Council on the consultation on the Green Paper on mobile and personal communications,

-having regard to the report of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs and Industrial Policy and the opinion of the Committee on Research, Technological Development and Energy (A4-0306/95),

A.whereas the Commission, in the present draft Directive, is acting upon its Green Paper, on which Parliament was able to give a generally favourable opinion,

B.whereas the Commission has incorporated in its draft Directive several elements which were missing from the Green Paper and the importance of which was stressed by Parliament, particularly:

-the fundamental role, for mobile communications, of the availability of a frequency spectrum which is sufficiently wide to allow investment to be planned in a predictable environment;

-the fact that the number of licences awarded must be commensurate with a capacity to meet the general terms governing service authorization and, in particular, public-service constraints;

-the chance for any given operator to offer a combination of different, complementary mobile technologies;

-the application of the rules of competition and the abolition of exclusive and special rights and the lifting of restrictions on access to alternative telecommunications and teledistribution infrastructures for the supply of mobile communications by 1 January 1996,

C.whereas the liberalization of the European mobile telecommunications market must not work to the advantage of operators in third countries unless these countries provide reciprocity for European suppliers,

1.Welcomes the Commission's draft directive in both its principles and its objectives;

2.Points out, however, that the procedure set out in Article 90(3), while providing a justifiable means of eliminating regulatory obstacles to competition, is nevertheless not intended as a substitute for the legislative instruments laid down by the Treaty, particularly Article 100a thereof, for the purpose of defining the operating rules of a given economic sector in the Union;

3.Takes the view, in particular, that the provisions of the draft directive must apply without prejudice to future Community legislation relating to the organization of telecommunications in the Union, particularly to interconnection and interoperability, the rules applying to universal service and those relating to numbering and directory services;

4.Stresses the need for transparency both in the conditions for granting licences and the arrangements for the use by mobile systems operators of their right to interconnection;

5.Rejects any derogation from the liberalization of the personal communications market in a given Member State which is not explicitly and transparently justified by the carrying out of the necessary structural adjustments;

6.Believes therefore that the following modifications must be made to the Commission's draft directive:

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