MP calls for fairer mobile phone call charges

9.39.00am BST (GMT +0100) Mon 28th Jun 2010

John Leech MP has today tightened the screws on Ofcom to make the cost of calling a mobile phone fairer for everyone.

John has led from the front on the "Terminate the rate" campaign which calls on Ofcom to lower the Mobile Termination Rate (MTR). The MTR is the fee that operators charge each other for carrying the call, when customers phone from a mobile phone to a different network. This fee, the Mobile Termination Rate, is normally around 4p for every minute of the call, and therefore adds up to billions of pounds for UK consumers.

John Leech has written to all 650 MPs asking them to join the campaign and support his efforts to make the cost of calling between networks fairer and more affordable.

John said, "MTRs are set far too high and do not represent the true cost of calling between networks. This means that people are paying far too much for their phone bills and most do not even know that they are incurring these costs. There is passionate and vocal support throughout Parliament and the public for lowering these rates and I strongly urge Ofcom to listen to these calls for fairness and transparency.''

In the last parliament 262 MPs signed an Early Day Motion supporting the campaign (making it the 7th most popular EDM overall), whilst over 135,000 members of the public have signed an online petition to lower MTRs to a penny or less.

Kevin Russell of 3 Mobile Network said ''inflated MTRs mean everybody pays too much for their phone bills and prevents innovative offers such as flat-rate unlimited calling plans. We think that all consumers deserve better value from the mobile phone market. Ofcom is now proposing to reduce MTRs, but wants to bring in the changes gradually over the next four years. We want to make sure this happens as soon as possible and make sure that Ofcom's proposal to bring down charges to reflect the real costs becomes a reality.''

The campaign is rapidly gaining momentum and featured in a full page editorial in yesterdays Guardian.

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John Leech MP | Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament for Manchester, Withington

House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA | www.john-leech.co.uk

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