Electronic Communications and Wireless Telegraphy (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Baroness Neville-Rolfe Excerpts

Thursday 7th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to wish the Minister well. We had a good debate in Grand Committee. We shared very frankly a number of views. There were questions relating to what kind of consultation had taken place; others were raised persistently and clearly by the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, and he has continued to pose them this morning. I was reassured by the letter that we received, which took up and dealt with a number of the questions that we had been struggling with.

Once again, as I said from the Dispatch Box yesterday, I am trying to make a clear distinction between what needs to happen to the statutory instrument laid before us—I am sure the matters arising from it have now been adequately aired—and the questions that will go on worrying us after this instrument has been passed; as we move into the next phase, we will be debating substantive issues that certainly have not been answered in a debate of this kind. For the purpose of dealing with the piece of business directly before us, I am happy to give our accord from these Benches, but not if that should be supposed to cancel, diminish or sideline the issues that have been raised from the other Benches.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

Unfortunately we do not have a satisfactory or agreed Brexit deal and we need a no-deal SI here and indeed in a number of other areas, so I support the Government on that. However, I would like to pick up a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Foster, on roaming, which I understand is broader than this SI. If this is to be a commercial decision in future for the mobile operators in the event of no deal, as we heard earlier, can the Government seek voluntary assurances from them that they will continue to incorporate overseas calls and internet access into their contracts? I have that facility from Three and it includes the EU and indeed the US, and I do not think the company is planning to change that. However, in addition to the consumer triggers that are being introduced and the very good provision on inadvertent Republic of Ireland roaming, I think Ofcom could require the operators to make a clear statement of their intentions in this area on such calls in the EU, and I think it should look at the ability of consumers to switch from deals that turn out to be bad as a result of the change.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

My Lords, I support the noble Lord, Lord Foster, in the concerns that he has raised. It is not just the Minister in the other place who says it is important for Ofcom to benefit from the continuing exchange of best regulatory practice; it is in paragraph 7.35 of the Explanatory Memorandum:

“However, the Government recognises that Ofcom would benefit from the continued exchange of regulatory best practice with other national regulatory authorities and the exchange of information about electronic communications matters more generally”.


The memorandum goes on at paragraph 7.36 to note that,

“the BEREC Regulation presently allows BEREC to invite observers to attend its meetings, and that the new BEREC Regulation is expected to provide that the Board of Regulators, the working groups and the Management Board should be open to the participation of regulatory authorities of third countries”—

which of course would include us in the event of no deal—

“where those countries have entered into agreements with the EU to that effect”.

My question is therefore about whether it is the intention of the Government that, in the event of no deal, Ofcom should urgently seek from other EU states an agreement that will allow Ofcom to have such observer status so that Ofcom can benefit from the continuing exchange of best regulatory practice, and indeed the regulators at BEREC can benefit from Ofcom’s expertise.