The House of Representatives and the Senate will set up a joint committee to vet the amended bill on the formation of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC), PM's Office Minister Ong-art Klampaiboon said yesterday.
He expected the bill to become law at the end of this year and the selection process for the NBTC commissioners to be completed in the middle of next year.
He added that the government wants to see the independent watchdog getting off the ground to regulate the vested interests in the broadcasting and telecom industries as soon as possible to prevent politicians from interfering in the two sectors for their own interest.
The Senate, which passed the bill in its second and third readings last month, with some major amendments, will send the amended bill to the House in August. The NBTC will replace the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) in overseeing the telecom and broadcasting sectors.
There are 23 points on which the Senate and the House disagreed in the amended bill. Their joint committee will focus the vetting on the appropriate number of NBTC commissioners and the grace period for TOT and CAT Telecom to still keep their concession revenue before they have to start transferring the whole amount to the state coffers.
The amended bill sees the NBTC commissioner number increasing to 15, up from 11 in the previous version. Of the additional four, two are from the national security field.
It also requires TOT and CAT to transfer their concession revenues directly to the NBTC, which will pass them on to the state treasury, after the NBTC law has been in effect for three years, a change from one year in the previous version.
The communications committees of the Senate and the House debated on the key issues yesterday at their own joint seminar on the NBTC law.
Senator Anant Worathitipong said the number of NBTC commissioners in the amended bill is appropriate, citing the need to have commissioners from the national security field.
But MP Pusadee Tamthai favours the commissioner number in the previous version. She says that with 15 commissioners, the NBTC will take time in making a final decision on key issues.
Anant said that three years would be an appropriate period for TOT and CAT to adjust their performance before they let go the concession revenue. But Somkiat Tangkitvanit, who was secretary of the House's bill-vetting committee, said they have been given enough time to adjust.
A representative from CAT said the clause risks attracting a lawsuit as it seems to hamper the telecom concessions.
According to the amended bill, two commissioners will have expertise in national security, three in the fields of education and culture, one in radio broadcasting and one in television broadcasting.
The others include two with telecom expertise, two with legal expertise, two with economics expertise and two from the field of consumer protection, with one related to radio and television broadcasting and the other to telecoms.