By Lisa Burroughes, 12 December 2000 18:00
NEWS The Office of Communications, or Ofcom as it has already been dubbed, will be run by a US-style board of executives rather than a single director and will combine the role of several regulators - Oftel, the ITC, the broadcasting standards commission and the radio authority. A single regulator won't mean less bite, according to e-minister Patricia Hewitt. She claimed the new body would hold greater power over the communications industry. "We will strengthen Ofcom by giving it Competition Act powers that Oftel currently doesn't have," she said. Stephen Byers, Trade and Industry secretary, added that an important part of Ofcom will be to regulate internet content under the same guidelines as broadcast and print. However, he added that "because of the global nature of the internet" most of the work will be carried out through the Internet Watch Foundation which has already established a regulatory process and is backed by the government. Hewitt added: "Ofcom will take an active role in rating material and the tools that can be used by parents to regulate content." A more controversial area of the white paper describing the plans addresses the role of the regulator with regard to the BBC. Lobbyists were hoping the government would give Ofcom greater control over the corporation to ensure it did not put emerging markets such as digital TV at a competitive disadvantage by using cross subsidisation. The government held back from introducing such an initiative. Consultation on the white paper will end in February, but the bill is unlikely to enter the legislation process until this time next year. A government official said he hoped the bill would get Royal Assent in the summer of 2002 and the body be set up by the beginning of 2003.
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