Speech by Prime Minister Yves Leterme of Belgium at the New Year Reception of KPN
13/01/2010
Het gesproken woord telt
Thank you for your kind words, Mr. President. I was glad to accept your invitation and I am still glad I did, even if I now again realise the truth of the dictum that there is no free lunch, in this case no free New Year party. I would not say ‘in cauda venenum’ about the remarks and questions at the end of your very interesting speech, but you do put some challenging remarks and questions to me. And I will try and answer them.
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen,
Being given questions to answer is not the only tricky part of being the second speaker. When a writer once submitted a manuscript to Samuel Johnson, the brilliant eighteenth century English author and critic read it and promptly answered: ‘Your manuscript is both good and original; but the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good.’
Now, rest assured, Mr. Scheepbouwer, this anecdote in no way reflects on the quality of your speech. But is does reflect on the difficulty of mine.
As a mere politician, I do not aspire to literary excellence, so the “good” does not come into question. But I cannot even be original, for I agree with everything you said about the centrality of the telecom sector and ICT to innovation and economic growth, and about their impact on all aspects of our life. I fully agree too that ICT will be part of the solution in the burning issues that face us, whether they relate to the environment, sustainable development or aging populations.
For all these reasons, and as an avid consumer of ICT services myself, I believe that my government must take all necessary measures to provide Belgium with the best possible telecom infrastructure, and with affordable and competitive communication services.
A priority is to tackle the digital divide in our country. Belgium has an exceptional coverage of 99,85% of the population by the broadband cable network, with almost two thirds connected by high speed technology. Only Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea and Switzerland have larger high speed broadband networks.
Nevertheless, at the end of 2008 only 64 percent of the Belgian families were connected to the broadband internet network. Considering the near 100% accessibility, this percentage is too low.The aim is to raise that percentage to 90 percent by 2015, the year that our Minister of Economy, Vincent Van Quickenborne, has set as the deadline to make Belgium “the digital heart of Europe”.Good quality and affordable mobile internet can play an important role in bringing more people to the net, and vice versa.
Today three mobile telecom operators are active on the Belgian market. You of course know them: Proximus, created in 1994, Mobistar, created in 1995, and Base, created in 1999. The first belongs to Belgacom, the second to France Télécom, the third, needless to say, to KPN. And frankly, Mr. President, I preferred it when your mobile network was called KPN Orange and your slogan was ‘The future is Orange’ because this happens to be the colour of my political party, CD&V. On the other hand, your choice to sponsor Standard-Liège proves that you are extremely wise and competent when it comes to football.
In this market of 4,2 billion euro, Proximus has a share of 47,5 percent, Mobistar of 37,2 percent, and Base of for 15,4% of the this global turnover. These percentages are roughly similar to those of the incumbents in neighbouring countries: KPN 51 percent in the Netherlands, France Télécom 47 percent in France en T-Mobile 36 percent in Germany. KPN is indeed an European player and so, I am glad to say, is Standard. So Base and Standard are very well matched.
I can assure you, Mr. President, that we value the presence of KPN in Belgium and its investment of 2 billion euro. We are also committed to a market with fair and open competition. This is why the government, over the past two years, has strengthened both the Competition Council, and the regulator for the communication sector, the Belgian Institute for Post and Telecommunications (BIPT). The government appointed a new board of directors for the BIPT on the basis of a selection procedure with an international jury.
You may be aware that the Competition Council on May 26th of last year, imposed a fine of 66,3 million euro on Proximus. The reason was abuse of its dominant position on the mobile telephone market. And last September, the Competition Prosecutors have brought a case before the Competition Council against Belgacom for reasons of abuse of dominance on the market for fixed telephony.” This goes to show that we take the rules of fair competition seriously, and that we apply them to all players.
You raise a serious problem, Mr. President, when you refer to the problems companies with a smaller domestic market encounter in some of the larger European countries. In spite of all declared policy on a free European market, there is still a large dose of economic nationalism around. The answer, in my opinion, has to be the enactment of clear, strong and enforceable European rules for fair and open markets. I think the Lisbon Treaty gives us more instruments to tackle those you call the “big boys”.
It will be a priority of the Belgian EU presidency, in the second half of this year, to contribute to further European integration and consolidation, now that the Lisbon Treaty has come into effect. In the sector which concerns us here tonight, telecom, we want the EU 2020 strategy to adopt more stringent rules and monitoring, not only for access and competitivity, but also for investment and innovation by the companies.
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen,I would like to finish by a reflection on the broader framework of the knowledge economy of which KPN is such a very dynamic part.
Your mobile telephone network Base, Mr. President, has a very successful and catchy commercial slogan: ‘Freedom of Speech’. Now, freedom of speech is not only a basic value of our democratic societies. The right to think freely and to speak freely is an essential part of human dignity, is the birthright of every human being on this world.
The digital revolution has made it incomparably more difficult for dictators and for repressive regimes to cut their people off from the free flow of information and ideas, inside and outside their countries. It also made it so much more difficult to close their countries for foreign eyes. Images sent by mobile phones for instance have become an important source of information.
This achievement overrides all the drawbacks of the knowledge revolution. Every good invention can be and has been misused, and this also applies to the revolution we are living now. The world wide net; all the new forms of instant world wide communication, carry not only knowledge and truthful information and stimulating ideas. They also spread lies and slander and racism.
At the beginning of this new year, I would like to express the wish that all of us, throughout the world, would use these marvellous digital tools with wisdom and foresight, not for hate speech and slander, but for peace, for durable development, for the common good of mankind.For the digital revolution brings us the fantastic chance to harness the knowledge and wisdom of the whole world to the solution of our common problems.
And finally, Mr. President, I present to KPN my very best wishes for a very successful year, also in Belgium. And to all of you present here, Ladies and Gentlemen, I present my most sincere wishes for a happy and prosperous year 2010.
