Free in this context is that everyone who already pays for broadband will still pay for it through increased taxes.
Untrue. From what I hear this is about getting a base level of fibre to everyone; some will pay for more.
Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
61–70 of 72 posts
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#62Well BT is available in all areas in the UK except for Kingston-Upon-Hull which has it's own broadband provider called KCOM which is enjoys a complete monopoly in the area with the city having fibre-optic in all areas. I wonder if this policy that given that it creates free-access to the internet but in the end it also creates a huge monopoly similar to KCOM that kills competition with the added bonus of only the big…
Literally 7% of people have fibre in the UK. How can you defend the behaviour of the companies involved? We need a radical solution; feeding market demand has been tried and it has failed.
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
Everyone's costs are going to go up significantly as a result of replacing broadband that mostly uses existing infrastructure with a program of ripping up every street in the country and installing new fibre optic connections to every house. Making it "free" and taxpayer-funded just means that there's no way to opt out of paying if the existing broadband is fast enough.
This program isn't "taxpayer funded". It's funded specifically by taxing tech companies, as is literally stated right below the headline in the article.
And it should be added than ultimately the tech companies will benefit most from this: larger markets for streaming and other services.
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#64Would nationalising the broadband provider remove a barrier to increased surveillance?
This is AFAICT the only genuine argument against the policy. But it’s being drowned out by hysteria over nationalising openreach, an omnishambles of an organisation if there ever was one.
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#65Would nationalising the broadband provider remove a barrier to increased surveillance?
It would probably remove barriers to censorship. Both main parties are reasonably hostile to free speech but Labour (or it's supporters) seem to me to be more hostile to "fake news" etc
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#66Maybe scrap HS2 and spend the money on this instead? Seems a better use of however many billion we're up to and would probably make more of a difference...
Why suddenly giving 100% of Britain 100mbs BB wont do much for the national productivity. That money would be better spent else where, better vocational training - Rebuilding the countries ability to say be able to make its own pistol or rifle Can you see the spending round where the Postmaster General competing against the other departments for more funding for police or the NHS vs subsidising BB.
I think you can 10x that bandwidth from what I hear.
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#67porn and VPN (to allow unfiltered internet) is charged extra though!
That's a Tory policy. Let's hope a Labour Government would also get rid of that.
I would expect Labour to put in place more blocks around things to protect the population against "extremist" content but porn would probably be ok for a while.
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why such bad grammar?
It's getting cold in Moscow
If Labour gets in I hope they use the nationalised internet to block russian fake news!
We need a firewall to protect us from Tory and Trump's friends
(Satire, but not far from the party line as Labour supporters also cry fake news these days)
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
>That's basically it. >If nothing else has worked, let's try threatening Openreach until service improves. That is basically NOT it and issuing random threats to incumbent telcos, whilst contemporaneously empowering them is definitely not the solution. The shameless politicking does not address how to fund the empty promises. The article in essence is debating whether or not, Labour (2030) vs Cons (2025) pledge of "f…
This is a well researched policy based on the government’s own analysis. I know people familiar with the current policy framework and (despite not being Corbyn fans) they think this is a good idea.
Ah, yes, of course, the super-secret 'CuRrEnT FrAmEwOrK PoLiCy' which you can't link to or share? By attributing any authority to what is essentially a loose collection of a government's ambitions, aspirations, pipe dreams and a random wish list of sorts, is rather fanciful, to say the least. The current talk of full-fibre broadband is just a manifesto pledge, which has already been downgraded to upto 'Gigabit broadband' by the Tories. This rhetoric is reminiscent of 'information superhighway/superfast broadband' buzzwords from the previous decades to capture urban/rural votes. Similarly, there are no detailed plans available on how it will be implemented or how any of this going to get funded ─ which could cost over £30 billion; then the Labour party are pledging to give it all away for free?!? In the absence of any hard facts, putting stock in any of these words uttered by someone, who knows somebody else, who then conducted some research and everybody thought it was a jolly good idea ─ rings alarm bells and means forgoing privacy in return for something perceived to be 'free', yet still being majority funded by the taxpayer.
I will leave you with the USO [Universal Service Obligation] from DCMS (Dept. for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport) as an amuse bouche on delusions of grandeur.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
Re: Labour pledges free broadband for all homes and firms in UK
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a well researched policy based on the government’s own analysis. I know people familiar with the current policy framework and (despite not being Corbyn fans) they think this is a good idea.
Ah, yes, of course, the super-secret 'CuRrEnT FrAmEwOrK PoLiCy' which you can't link to or share? By attributing any authority to what is essentially a loose collection of a government's ambitions, aspirations, pipe dreams and a random wish list of sorts, is rather fanciful, to say the least. The current talk of full-fibre broadband is just a manifesto pledge, which has already been downgraded to upto 'Gigabit broadb…
By “current policy framework”, I meant the way things are working right now. The person I was referring to has been involved with policy making all over the UK, and knows a great deal about the subject. I believe you misinterpreted this as “labour’s detailed plans.” Just wanted to make that clear.
If you’d have been civil, I would have been happy to ask my contact for appropriate reading and share them with you. As it is, I feel even responding is giving a nasty troll too much of my time.