Don’t fuck with the phone cops, they play hardball - Johnny Fever
It was similarly regulated in the USA. That started to crack in 1968 with the Carterfone case, and was finally overturned in 1975 by Part 68 rules. A few years later there were direct-connect devices.
My grandmother “leased” a rotorary dial phone from like 1960 to 1991. They forced her to get touch tone. She said can you come get your phone?
No maam, you can keep it.
Yeah, I remember leasing a phone. When the bell system was broken up in 1984, we didn't have to do that anymore. We also got direct dial long distance, before that it was dial zero and tell the operator you wanted to make a long distance call. That seems so alien now.
GTE wanted that ancient pumpkin orange rotary trimline back, and my mother was happy to give it to them. She hated that color.