MSE News: Row erupts over rushed-through broadband tax plans

del1001

fiddiwebb wrote: »

Why the hell should my 80 year old mother pay a extra £6 a year to subsidise broadband that she does not have, never will have and is not in the tiny bit interested in having :mad:

Precisely the point, why should anyone that has a landline pay a tax for broadband that they don't have or want, it would be like being forced to pay road tax when you don't have a car.

MothballsWallet

mrJ wrote: »

Who said it will go to BT? The news article didn't say BT.... anything to do with broadband is BT's fault it seems....

BT is the ILE (Incumbent Local Exchange) carrier in the majority of the UK, so they (or at least Openreach) are responsible for the infrastructure - wiring, street cabinets, exchange hardware, poles, etc. So the money will have to go to them. Of course, if this goes through, MPs will be able to reclaim it on expenses

Even the other telecoms companies who offer broadband to residential and business customers over the telephone network (instead of fibre optic cable) rely on hiring part of BT (Openreach) to actually make equipment installations.

Essentially, you get billed by your telephony and broadband provider for your line rental, calls and internet, but they are a layer above BT Wholesale and BT Openreach.

mrJ_5

But the money can be used to ramp up deployment of WiMax and other non-BT supplied services. It can also be used by companies to lay fibre down (there are several, such as H2O Networks - though I've forgotten their new name), again, not via BT - so can't assume every penny will go to BT, nor can assume that they will get nothing . . .