Vol. 466 No. 1
24 Miss Harney asked the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications whether individual briefing sessions have been held with each of the unsuccessful applicants for the second GSM licence; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [10857/96]
Individual briefing sessions were held with four of the five unsuccessful consortia in my Department on 14 and 15 May 1996. The fifth unsuccessful consortium had been invited to attend but did not take up the offer. As promised, they were given information about their own applications with particular reference to areas where they were weak relative to other applications.
25 Mr. Molloy asked the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications if he has received notification from the European Commission that it is in receipt of a complaint regarding the entire process surrounding the awarding of the GSM licence in Ireland, involving breaches of Community competition rules under Articles 85 to 94, in particular Articles 90 (1), 92, 92 (1) and 86, breaches of Commission Directive 90/388 as amended by Commission Directive 96/2/EEC and breaches of principles of objectivity, openness, transparency, proportionality and nondiscrimination; if so, the action, if any, he intends to take regarding this complaint; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [10853/96]
I confirm that I have received from the Eurpean Commission an advance copy of the complaint made to them by one of the unsuccessful consortia in relation to the competition process leading to the award of the GSM mobile telephony licence. Lest there be any doubt arising from this question, the complaint alleges certain breaches but I do not accept that any breaches were involved. I will be responding to the Commission in due course. As I have said before, I am confident that the GSM competition process will withstand any scrutiny.
