Access regime
The Trade Practices Act provides a system under which businesses can obtain access to essential facilities that cannot be economically duplicated, but to which access is necessary in order to compete. It does this by setting up a mechanism under which:
- services provided by essential facilities can be 'declared';
- businesses can obtain access to 'declared' services; and
- owners or those in control of a facility can give the ACCC access undertakings.
Telecommunications regime
The Trade Practices Act contains a telecommunications specific access regime which requires network operators to offer 'declared services' (such as interconnection and local loop access) to their rivals. The ACCC has the power, under some circumstances, to arbitrate access disputes and will do so using a long run incremental cost approach.
