The sixth meeting of the RSPG working group (WG) on the European Electronic Communications Code (RSPG EECC) was held last 31 January in Brussels. This WG, chaired by France (Agence Nationale des Fréquences (ANFR)), Hungary (National Media and Infocommunications Authority (NMHH)) and Germany (Ministry of Transportation and Digital Infrastructure), was created in early 2019 to identify new tasks the RSPG should carry out and to propose the actions needed to accomplish them (e.g. amendment of the rules of procedure (RoP) and of the decision establishing the RSPG, identification of new items to include in the group’s working programme and adjustment of the peer review (PR) to the rules envisaged in the Code).
This meeting’s participants included representatives of the European Commission and delegates representing 13 member-states1 and Norway. Portugal was represented by ANACOM.
The operationalisation of the PR procedure (inter-peer analysis) which the new European regulatory framework has tasked the RSPG with implementing was debated at length at this meeting. Particularly discussed were aspects such as the system for communication of relevant proposed decisions in the PR context and indication of the member-states’ willingness to submit the proposal to inter-peer analysis, the method for scheduling group forums, the chairmanship and the place for holding the Peer Review Forum (PRF), and the procedure and trigger for holding an extraordinary PRF, i.e. without the member-state concerned having requested it.
Lastly, the European electronic communications code was notably published in the OJEU2 on 17 December 2018 and took force three days later. The member-states have accordingly been granted a transition period for transposition of the directive; the respective deadline is 21 December 2020. Some of its articles must nevertheless be applied immediately; in the case of provisions involving spectrum, article 53, paragraph 2 (coordinated calendar for allocating harmonised bands for mobile broadband) and article 54 (coordinated calendar for specific bands for 5G) are in that situation.
The next RSPG EECC meeting has been scheduled for 14 March 2019 in Brussels.
