Mr. Jeremy Godfrey:

There is an overlap. As I mentioned to Deputy Dooley when I was discussing state aid, there are matters that have nothing to do with significant market power. These include looking after the money, ensuring that the networks are rolled out and so forth. The behavioural aspects of the obligations are in many ways similar. State aid guidelines encourage member states to align behavioural obligations to what might be imposed under significant market power, in particular, the requirement to treat all retail service providers in a non-discriminatory manner. However, the state aid guidelines also say it is perfectly reasonable and to be expected that some additional obligations might potentially be required in exchange for state aid. For example, under ComReg's regulation of Eir, there is a set of products we require the company to make available on a wholesale basis. The recommended products required to be made available in the state aid context are a somewhat greater set of products. We do not believe it is necessary or proportionate to require Eir to develop those products in commercial areas that it is required to develop in the other area.

There is another issue. ComReg's regulation of significant market power operates on a five-year cycle. Every five years we have to study the market and check whether one entity has significant market power. We have to check whether this causes competition problems and what the appropriate remedies are. Where it is envisaged for a state aided company, it is not unreasonable for the State to want to have the access obligations apply for the entire length of the contract.