In the latest of a series of controversial plans for the multi-billion-pound telecoms market, officials are looking at centralising the management of spectrum with the creation of a European spectrum agency.

The agency could oversee the management of spectrum and the licensing of it — potentially overriding national regulators, such as Ofcom.

Industry experts fear that the proposal, part of a wider planned review of European telecoms rules, could mean that money raised from individual spectrum auctions would head back to Brussels, instead of to individual governments, as at present.

Last night a spokesman for Ofcom, the UK regulator, said that the plans raised “interesting questions about the ownership of what is currently treated as a finite national asset”.

A Department of Trade and Industry spokesman said: “Although putting the idea ‘on the table’ for discussion is quite appropriate for a discussion document for public consultation, this is not legislation.”

The plan for the agency was laid out in a speech yesterday by Viviane Reding, the European Commissioner for Information Society and Media, to Bitkom, a German IT and communications trade body.

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