Slashdot Mirror
UK Broadband Plan Set To Clear EU Approval
judgecorp writes "The British government's plan to subsidize rural broadband in the UK is about to get approval from the European Union, even though every contract so far has been awarded to BT, according to sources. The Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK) project has been examined under EU state aid rules, but apparently has passed despite all the money going to one dominant telecom operator"
The seem to be all fine and dandy with it ... as if there's nobody else out there who would dream of having extremely poor business practices.
Actually, BT is probably in bed with the current government
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Let's say you live on a block. You have crack. You would like to sell this crack to people who really want to buy crack. If nobody is selling crack, and you have crack willing to sell, why would this be a problem?
Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
I think it's very important to spread the dosh around, because everywhere else that this has been done, governments have relied on robust competition between scrappy telecoms companies to provide rural broadband service...
Well except in Korea, where it was all done by Korea Telecom, but then again, they finished their 100 Mbps rollout 5 years ago and are now providing 1000 Mbps service to rural areas, so what do they know about this stuff?
The real story here is that the UK govt isnt giving money to communal rural broadband programs. That is what this story is about. BT(wholesale) owns the vast majority of the UK's phone lines and internet access(with the exception of cable where you can get it). The systems in place only seem to acknowledge broadband extension programmes from big companies so as apparently to avoid communities setting up their own broadband networks etc. This is pretty disgraceful (but old) news from the British govt. It was on radio 4 about a month ago...
25 quid for 250GB? I'll have a pound of whatever you're smoking.
If you want me to pay "per GB", 10p/GB doesn't float my boat. Try 2p/GB and I'll think about it.
I already pay £23 for 300 gig peak rate, completely unlimited off peak. As tempting as your offer is - no. As for pay-for services traffic, do you mean you'd charge extra for that traffic?
As I understand the situation, the councils that want to get part of the rural broadband money have to use "approved suppliers" and there are only two of them.
There is really not that much competition with only two companies available, though I am sure other companies could also do some of the projects.
The problem is thus that because it is a national program with only central authorization of suppliers with pretty high barrier of entry given the types of documentation and other things required to "prove" that you are capable to doing such on national level, this leads to companies that have only a regional presence not really being able to be suppliers...
Just give the money to municipal or communal efforts for local fibre-to-the-whatever, or use the money to improve BT after having nationalised it. Otherwise we're doomed to see BT drag their heels and pocket subsidies while our infrastructure lags 20 years behind that of more advanced countries.
If I were British, I would be annoyed that my country doesn't have the sovereignty to handle its own internal affairs, but that's just me.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
I pay £9.50 a month for my O2 unlimited connection. I can pull 250Gb over that fine and I run mail and web services off it as well.
This isn't a case of gaining the EU's permission simply for show, it's all about keeping the European Union's inner market open and competitive. This is the core mission of the EU(!) Free and unhindered trade amongst the members. It's a two-way street.
If the British government(s) want to spend their money on rural broadband, that's just great, but they can't simply hand the money to their own preferred partners (BT). That would be illegal state subsidies. There has to be free and open competition for the contracts!
That's all there is to this case. All the other EU member states have the exact same scrutiny from Brussels, where equally eager British representatives are watching out for their own interests.
The real issue however is the fact that such subsidies would be illegal even without the EU. I'm pretty sure it would run afoul of the World Trade Organization (WTO). I will just mention the Boeing and Airbus cases.
> They've been forced for years to share access to their exchanges, lease the last mile, providing access for LLU.
> They probably have by far the best established network in the UK (for residential customers at least). Its actually pretty damned good overall if you negate the fact its *DSL and you'll only get speeds based on line quality / length.
> Despite being a fully owned private company, they were split into two. The network provider (OpenReach) and the ISP (BT).
> Unfortunately both OpenReach and BT are owned by the same people.
> Their customer support is appalling.
> They stick their hands out for Government money whenever possible.