European Parliament and the Council engaged in trilogue negotiations on Gigabit Infrastructure Act (GIA) immediately after the EU Telecoms Council approved its general approach on 5 December.

Tacit approval for permit-granting and rights of way, guidance on access to physical infrastructure and price regulation for intra-EU voice calls and SMS are among the most contentious issues.

Under the draft GIA and the lead Parliament Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) committee report, the Commission may set guidelines clarifying the rules on access to physical infrastructure, civil works coordination and access to in-building physical infrastructure.

The Council argues against EU-wide guidelines and instead calls for member states to play a role in providing any guidance on the GIA application.

Both the Commission proposal and the Parliament ITRE report consider that a lack of authorities’ response within the set deadlines would be considered as tacit approval of permits and rights of way.

The variety of different legal systems among the member states however poses a problem.

While the Council agrees on the importance of cutting the administrative burden and deadlines, it recognises that tacit approval clause needs to be weighed carefully.

The Council proposes to delete the clause from the GIA text considering the fact that each member states has different constitutional regimes with differing administrative rules.

Find out more:

Cullen International’s “Tracker” covers the latest developments related to the GIA. It includes overviews of the draft proposals of the European Commission, European Parliament and the Council, and is regularly updated to reflect the latest proposed amendments and positions.

For access to the Tracker, please click on “Access the full content” - or on “Request Access”, in case you are not subscribed to our European Telecoms service.