Telecommunications

The Electronic Communications Code

There has been a considerable amount of litigation under the New Electronic Communications Code over the last half decade, and Landmark barristers have been heavily involved in this work, representing and advising both landowners and code operators. Landmark barristers have appeared in a large proportion of the reported cases both in the Upper Tribunal and the appellate courts.

The Code contains the matrix of legal rights given to, and liabilities imposed upon, telecommunications operators in order to allow them to install and maintain all forms of electronic communications networks on land. This area of law plays to Landmark’s core strengths in real estate law and in compulsory purchase law, together with its great experience in promoting infrastructure projects.

Landmark’s property team built up extensive experience of all aspects of the previous version of the Code, contained in the Telecommunications Act 1984, including in the Court of Appeal case of GEO Networks Ltd v The Bridgewater Canal Company Ltd [2010] EWCA Civ 1348.

Landmark barristers were involved in the development of the New Code by:

Giving advice to the Law Commission on the state of the existing law, advising HM Government on its proposals for reform of the 1984 Code and assisting with the drafting of lobbying documents on behalf of operators and site providers;
Advising a number of new entrants into the electronic communications market, seeking to take advantage of the 2017 Code to become operators or the providers of telecommunications infrastructure networks.

Landmark is now leading the way under the New Code, enacted in the Digital Economy Act 2017.

Landmark regularly acts for landowners, operators of electronic communications networks (both mobile telephone operators and fixed-line operators) and infrastructure providers. Landmark’s property team is pleased to accept licensed access instructions from surveyors acting for either landowners or operators.

Landmark barristers have acted in a considerable number of ‘firsts’ under the New Code, including the first assessment of consideration (EE v Islington), the first two Court of Appeal cases (Compton Beauchamp and University of London), the first redevelopment trial (EE v Meyrick), the first contested trial on whether to impose an agreement or not (University of the Arts), and the first grant of an Order requiring removal of apparatus (Crawley v EE).

Landmark barristers were involved in all three of the cases which eventually made their way up to the Supreme Court, at differing stages of the appellate process (Compton Beauchamp, Ashloch and On Tower (formerly Arqiva)).

Other reported cases in which Landmark barristers have acted include Keast, which considered the scope of terms that could be included in a Code agreement, Evolution (Shinfield), the first application for an Order for removal, CTIL v Hackney, which considered the terms of an interim agreement, and EE v Morriss, a 1954 Act telecoms lease renewal in which terms and rent were in dispute.

Landmark is able to offer a range of juniors and silks in respect of telecoms matters, and Landmark juniors regularly act as sole counsel against silks in such disputes.

Landmark has also been able to use its public law and regulatory expertise to advise in respect of the Government consultation into changes to the Code under the Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Act 2022. Having a specialism in local government law and many local government clients, Landmark barristers have also been involved in advising local authorities in respect of fibre and wireless networks on local authority land.

Planning

Landmark’s town and country planning team also has extensive experience in dealing with issues surrounding the erection and retention of telecommunications masts.

Landmark’s expertise across the range of land-based disciplines means that it is able to assist when planning issues arise in Code cases. Equally, where a landowner is seeking to redevelop land on which telecoms apparatus is present, Landmark’s breadth of expertise means that in addition to helping to promote the development scheme in the planning sphere, Landmark barristers can also advise on the impact of the presence of telecoms apparatus and strategies for its relocation or obtaining vacant possession.