ANACOM has sent the draft project for the transposition of the European Electronic Communications Code to the Government and to Parliament. This will replace the Electronic Communications Act, which has been subject to individual amendments over the years.
The ANACOM proposal is in accordance with the European Electronic Communications Code, the discussion and preparation of which it has played an active part in over recent years. The Code establishes the new regulatory framework that will respond to the increasing connectivity needs of national and European citizens, particularly through measures that will stimulate investment in very high capacity networks. Thus, new mechanisms for market regulation have been put in place, a different approach to the universal service has been proposed in order to respond to specific connectivity needs and harmonised rules in terms of spectrum management have been put in place with the aim of creating conditions to promote the rapid implementation of 5G in Europe.
User protection deserves particular attention, and a reinforcement of rights has been proposed in terms of subscriber mobility in the market, in line with the recommendations formulated by the Competition Authority, recovering some of the proposals on this subject submitted by ANACOM to the Government and Parliament in February 2019. These include revising and clarifying the limits to be applied to the value of the costs to be paid by subscribers in the event of early termination of contracts with loyalty periods. It is proposed that these costs should no longer be associated with the value of loyalty period obligations so far deemed justified, but rather should have a maximum limit of a percentage of the value of the outstanding monthly payments, according to the contract time already complied with.
With regard to the appointment of members of the Board of Directors in order to comply with the open and transparent selection process provided for in the Electronic Communications Code, ANACOM proposes a public tender type of selection process under conditions to be defined. These should continue to ensure the principle of transparency and the mechanisms for legitimisation by the sovereign bodies, under the terms deemed adequate and in compliance with the gender alternation rule for the Chair of the Board of Directors and a minimum of 33% representation of each gender in the members of that board.
The draft project for the transposition was approved by ANACOM on 31 July, in compliance with the priority of the actions provided for in its activity plan for the 2020-2022 three-year period and in response to the request made under the scope of its duties to assist the Government.
During the preparation of this draft project, the many contributions received under the scope of the public hearing on the transposition of the EECChttps://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1500585, launched by this Authority on 26 November 2019 were taken into account.
Consult:
- Approval of the draft project for transposition of the European Electronic Communications Code https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1557846
