1st Contact Network meeting for 2016 in Krakow
The 1st meeting of the BEREC Contact Network (CN) for 2016 took place on 4 and 5 February 2016 in Krakow, kindly hosted by the Polish Office of Electronic Communications (UKE). The meeting was chaired by Annegret Groebel - Head of the International Relations Department at BNetzA, representative of the BEREC Chair 2016, Wilhelm Eschweiler – Vice-President of BNetzA.
The meeting was attended by senior representatives of the NRAs with primary responsibility for overseeing the day-to-day operation of the markets for electronic communications networks and services. NRAs from the EU Member States, the EFTA States and the States that are candidates for accession to the EU were represented. Representatives of the European Commission and the EFTA Surveillance Authority (ESA) also attended the meeting.
The main objective of the meeting was to prepare the 26th ordinary plenary meetings of the BEREC Board of Regulators (BoR) and the BEREC Office Management Committee (MC) to take place on 25 and 26 February 2016 in Rotterdam (The Netherlands). Consequently, the BEREC Contact Network (CN) considered all possible topics to be included in the BoR and MC agendas and concluded the following:
The CN agreed to submit the following documents to the BoR:
As ‘A’ items (without presentation and discussion) for approval for publication:
- Draft 16th International Roaming BEREC Benchmark Data Report April-September 2015.
As regular items (with presentation and discussion):
For approval and publication:
- Draft BEREC Guidelines on the application of the Roaming Regulation as amended by the TSM Regulation;
- Draft BEREC Report on the wholesale roaming market (also for submission to the Commission as the BEREC contribution to the Commission PC on the review of national wholesale roaming markets, fair use policy and the sustainability mechanism defined in the Roaming Regulation as amended by the TSM Regulation);
- Draft BEREC Reports on OTT Services and on the outcome of the public consultation (PC) on the draft Report on OTT Services;
- Draft BEREC Report on European benchmarking of OTT indicators, subject to amending the document title in order to reflect its content;
- Draft BEREC Reports on enabling Internet of Things and on the outcome of the PC on the draft Report on enabling Internet of Things;
For approval for internal use:
- Draft BEREC Report on the outcome of the BEREC expert workshop on regulatory implications of software-defined networking (SDN) and network functions virtualisation (NFV).
For information and consideration:
- Draft BEREC Annual Reports 2015 (which will be up-dated after the meeting with information from the DESI on broadband coverage and submitted to the BoR for approval by electronic voting procedure);
- 10th Assessment Report on Article 77/a, Phase II Cases – Conclusions;
- Work Programme 2016 status update;
- Overview of the electronic voting procedures since the 25th plenary meetings (10-11 December 2015, London);
The BoR will be briefed in relation to the recent activities of the BEREC Chair and important events, in which he took part on behalf of BEREC, important projects carried out by the BEREC Office in support to BEREC and the recent and forthcoming BEREC international activities.
The Commission was also invited to provide the BoR with information on other important activities not included in the meeting agenda.
Other important topics discussed:
The Benchmarking EWG was requested to analyse the experience gained during the transitional period, to revise the draft Rules of Procedure in line with the outcome of this analysis and to submit the document to the BoR for approval during its 27th plenary meeting (2-3 June 2016, Vienna).
Documents to be submitted to the BEREC Office MC:
The CN agreed to submit the following documents to the MC:
As ‘A’ items (without presentation and discussion) - for approval for publication:
- Draft MC Decision on the working language at the BEREC Office.
As regular items (with presentation and discussion):
For approval for publication:
- Draft MC Decision on the termination of the appointment of the Interim Accounting Officer and on the appointment of the Commission Accounting Officer as the BEREC Office Accounting Officer.
For information and discussion:
- Final Audit Report on the activities under Article 7 and 7a including stakeholders relationship management and external communication and action plan to address the recommendations of the auditor;
- Explanatory Note on transfers by Administrative Manager in BEREC Office Budget 2015 in October-December 2015;
- 2015 BEREC Office Report on operation and budget execution;
- 2015 BEREC Office Report on budgetary and financial management;
The MC will be briefed in relation to the recent activities of the BEREC Office Advisory Group (BAG), the activities of the MC Vice-Chair exercising the powers conferred on the appointing authority by the Staff Regulations of Officials of the EU and the powers conferred on the authority entitled to conclude contracts by the Conditions of employment of other servants of the EU and the next steps in the preparation of the Annual and Multiannual Programming Documents of the BEREC Office Activities for 2017-2019.
Subject on the progress of the selection procedure, the MC will either be briefed orally on the state of play of the appointment of Head of Administration and Finance or will be requested to approve a decision on the appointment of the successful candidate and on the establishment of a reserve list.
The next meeting of the CN will take place on 12 and 13 May 2016 in Budapest (Hungary) and will be hosted by the Hungarian National Media and Infocommunications Authority (NMHH).