“Historic” digital commitment planned
By Alex Stevenson
The government plans to move towards a “historic universal service commitment” bringing broadband and digital services to all homes, culture secretary Andy Burnham has said.
Mr Burnham told the Commons the move, which will include developing options up to 2mb/s, will be modelled on the approach to “postal services and telephones in centuries past” in a bid to improve fairness and access to
The announcement came as part of the government’s response to Lord Carter’s review of Britain’s digital, communication and creative sectors, which published its interim report today.
These sectors are worth over £52 billion a year and Mr Burnham reaffirmed the government’s ambitions to develop it over the next five to ten years.
Upgrading and modernising networks, encouraging further investment, securing UK-made public service content, fair access for all and developing the infrastructure needed for this are all to be prioritised.
“The government has today set out an ambitious vision to make sure Britain reaps the full economic and social benefits of the digital age,” Mr Burnham said.
“An intensive period of discussions with industry partners and others must now begin. In publishing this interim report today, and making this statement to the House, we seek to invite members. to engage in the debate around these fundamental questions that will shape our country’s economy and society in this century.”
Mr Burnham also revealed the government wanted a “strong and secure” future for the BBC but said it wanted to “explore” ways in which a new “sustainable public service organisation” could be built “building on the strength of Channel 4”.
Shadow culture secretary Jeremy Hunt pointed out that Britain compared poorly with many other developed countries on digital issues. He said 40 per cent of households continued to lack broadband and the number of connections actually decreased in the last year.
Mr Hunt was critical of action number one – “to establish a government-led strategy group” – saying this was “no action at all”.
And he added: “All sides of the House are united in their desire to maximise the strength of our creative economy… When it comes to delivery of that content, we are lagging behind.”
Lord Carter will publish his final report before parliament rises this summer.
