A system has user equipment (1; 2) each having buffers (3, 4, 5, 6; 7, 8, 9, 10) for storing packets classified according to priority and ready for transmission over a radio interface to a network element (12). In such a system, user equipment sends capacity request signals (11; 13) indicative of the various priorities of the buffered packets on the radio interface to the network element. Rather than seeking a capacity allocation decision from a higher level in the core network, the network element itself makes the capacity allocation decision and provides a capacity allocation signal (14) to the user equipment. Packets that have thus been allocated capacity by the network element are then sent from the user equipment to the network element. Having the network element make the capacity allocation decisions itself is a more efficient system since the network element is in direct communication with the user equipment over the radio interface and the decision is made in an unmediated way.