From the ACCC: Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Chairman Rod Sims, speaking at the Australia Israel Chamber of Commerce in Brisbane, has said that the ACCC is is well placed to deal with the many issues flowing from the continuing communications industry revolution.
Mr Sims spoke of the benefits of a combined competition, consumer and communications economic regulator, stating that “different organisations with different roles would clearly trip over each other as they sought to regulate their part of the communications industry.”
Mr Sims claimed that telecommunications industry regulation in Australia was now strong, and identified a number of areas the ACCC is paying close attention to, including consumer issues relating to the NBN, competition issues that can flow from how ISPs manage congestion, the issue of control of content, and how technology can affect other sectors in general.
Speaking of the role that the ACCC sees for itself in the future, Mr Sims said:
The ACCC needs to constantly scan the environment to identify future issues, and to weigh up whether or not to intervene … It’s a fine balance between giving markets sufficient time to work issues out…but not so much time that markets fail … Given the amazing dynamics of the communications market, however, the ACCC has a bias to waiting to make sure the market cannot address an issue before we consider intervention.
You can read more about the speech here and find a full transcript here.