Eircom was in danger of being "destroyed" by the regulator of the communications sector, a trade union leader claimed yesterday.
In an attack on the Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg), Mr Con Scanlon said both Eircom and An Post were victims of a "heavy-handed" regulatory approach which made it impossible for them to manage their businesses.
Mr Scanlon, general secretary of the Communications Workers' Union, told the conference that experience of regulation differed between sectors. Unions in the ESB, for example, might not have the concerns of workers in An Post and Eircom.
"One regulator on the face of it has adopted a policy of change and sustainable competition; the other has embarked on a course that will eventually destroy Eircom."
His comments were rejected by ComReg, which said it had a statutory obligation to regulate the telecommunications sector, and did so with "objectivity, integrity and impartiality".
Mr Scanlon said the regulator had said Eircom was "60 per cent inefficient", but had offered no scientific basis for this view.
A spokesman for ComReg, Mr Tom Butler, said the charge that it had embarked on a course that would destroy Eircom was "patently untrue".
