The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission today issued a Final Report which sets expiry dates for existing declarations* for telecommunications services.
Under transitional provisions associated with the new Section 152ALA of the Trade Practices Act 1974 which came into force in December 2002, the ACCC is required to specify an expiry date for each existing declaration.
Once an expiry date has been established, the new provisions also require the ACCC to undertake a public inquiry into whether a particular declaration should expire in the six month period prior to when the declaration is due to expire.
Following the public inquiry, the ACCC can further extend the expiry date for a specified declaration by a period of up to five years.
"The expiry dates established under the current process should be seen as the dates prior to which the ACCC will hold a public inquiry on the appropriateness of revoking particular declarations or of extending the duration of those declarations", ACCC Chairman, Professor Allan Fels, said today.
"Reviewing existing declarations is important because it ensures that regulation will only continue to apply when it will still be in the long-term interests of consumers and end-users of telecommunications services".
The Final Report identifies the services which are currently declared and sets out a number of principles which the ACCC has taken into account when developing the declaration expiry timetable. The Report then presents a timetable for the expiry date of each declared service.