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Follow on Google News |  When is an independent regulator not independent? - OfcomIf an independent regulator is to be just that - independent, we should not expect senior members to be sharing sensitive information with competing companies. So, why did Rhodri Williams do just that?
By: Wispa Limited Ofcom is the communications regulator. Funded by ‘fees from industry’ and grant-in-aid from Government (taxes from you and I), the people who work in Ofcom exist (in their own words) to: “…regulate the TV and radio sectors, fixed line telecoms and mobiles, plus the airwaves over which wireless devices operate.” they further go on to say: “The Act says that Ofcom’s general duties should be to further the interests of citizens and of consumers. Meeting these two duties is at the heart of everything we do.” Problem is, Rhodri Williams (Director of Wales for Ofcom) thinks that it is also his job to share information with a few chosen suppliers, when he gets time sensitive information from a company. This type of ‘market interference’ On 30th of July this year Richard Brown (COO Wispa Limited) sent the following message, via email to Rhodri Williams: Hi Rhodri I’m willing to bet your life is plenty busy at the moment! As a bit of a courtesy (well – you were always so helpful when I was at exwavia!), and as the attached mentions Ofcom – I thought I would give you a heads up before the Press start reading it. The PDF is a bit of a lashup of what will go to International/ Don’t hurt your wrists trying to get the attachment open – Ofcom are only mentioned in passing – but as I said, I wanted to extend the same courtesy to you that you extended to me. All the best The PDF referred to is here: Wales – Online Village Idiot - http://us1.campaign- As it says in the email to Williams. This was sent to him as a courtesy as Ofcom were mentioned. What happened next was a stunning display of the total lack of independence that Williams displays. The email was forwarded to a total of six other recipients. No big deal on the face of it – seems sensible to share information inside Ofcom. Unfortunately, one of the recipients was an organisation responsible for starting Wales Internet Service Providers Association, who insist on using the acronym WISPA (obviously our Limited company name). Why would Williams share this information with them? The chairman of Wales Internet Service Providers Association is none other than Hywel Wiliam – ex Ofcom. So, the Ofcom boys (ex and current) think that it is okay to send emails to competing organisations, simply because their mate works there. In this country, and the way that policy and regulation is being handled, they are almost certainly right in believing that they can do whatever they like, without control, and without being questioned about it. Why should Ofcom operate in an independent and neutral manner if it doesn’t suit them? What are we going to do about it? Well, Mr Williams – here’s what this company is going to do about it. We’ll print the evidence of your flagrant disregard for independence here: =============================== To rhodri.williams@ From richard@ Subject Heads up Sent on 30-Jun- 1st Open 30-Jun-11 at 14:37:37pm +01:00 (86%) Bristol, England, United Kingdom Tracking Details Forwarded/opened on different computer Opened 30-Jun- Location Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom (86% likelihood) Opened on ssl¸nsuk¸ Browser used by recipient: Moz/4.0 (MSIE 7.0; WinNT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/4.0; Re-opened (by earlier reader #2) Opened 30-Jun- Location Manchester, England, United Kingdom (86% likelihood) Opened on titanium¸ Language of recipient’s PC: en-us (English/United States), en;q=0.5 (English) Browser used by recipient: Moz/5.0 (Win; U; Windows NT 6.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.18) Accepts Files browser can open: i/png,i/*;q= Re-Opened (by earlier reader #3) Opened 30-Jun- Location London, England, United Kingdom (86% likelihood) Opened on host109- Browser used by recipient: Moz/4.0 (MSIE 7.0; WinNT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/5.0; Last log No more activity after 30-Jun-11 at 18:39:28pm (UTC +01:00) – Log data indicates email was read for at least 1min41secs (approx.) Forwarded/opened on different computer Opened 30-Jun- Location Telford, England, United Kingdom (86% likelihood) Opened on 78-32- Language of recipient’s PC: en-us (English/United States) Browser used by recipient: Moz/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_2 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/ Summary – as at 30-Jun-11 at 20:53:48pm (UTC +01:00) – 6hours27mins33secs after sending Total Opened 11 times by 6 readers Reader #1 Opened 3 times for 8mins12secs total Reader #2 Opened 3 times Reader #3 Opened 2 times for 9mins1sec total Reader #4 Opened 1 time Reader #5 Opened 1 time Reader #6 Opened 1 time Click here for up-to-date (live) tracking information. This confirmation was produced and sent at: 30-Jun-11 at 20:53:48pm (UTC +01:00) (30-Jun-11 19:53:48 GMT) courtesy of http://www.ReadNotify.com with times converted to ‘GMT+1′ time; and refers to an original email of sender reference ID and ReadNotify.com reference 2904457477beb3c58eb97feda49bd551 and only acknowledges that the message was displayed (ie: not necessarily read or understood) on the recipient’s machine. You can change your settings (including turning off these email read notifications, or getting them instead by ICQ, SMS, or Pager) from the ReadNotify web site. ReadNotify.com E-mail Proof-of-Opening- =============================== And then we shall be using the information on the Complaints about Ofcom page of the Ofcom website, to make a complaint about Mr Williams’ interfering with the localised competitiveness of the Communications Industry in Wales. How, seriously do we expect Ofcom to take this complaint? Based on the actions of the most senior person in Wales, it seems unlikely to get much of a hearing to be honest. If this level of corrupt behaviour is prevalent by the Director of Wales, it seems a fair extrapolation that this is considered acceptable behaviour. # # # Started by Welsh Broadband industry professional Richard Brown (previously a founding director of exwavia Limited). End
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