On again - off again broadband tax
Rumours around country suggest that the plans for adding a 50p monthly tax on landlines to help fund the creation of faster networks in the UK may soon be abandoned or at least postponed until after the General Election is over in 2010.
Stephen Timms, a minister in charge of the Digital Britain strategy, has issued several statements to newspapers that point towards the delay of the tax stating that during a General Election there tends to be a short finance bill and it is unlikely that the bill would pass during this time period.
When asked directly if the bill would be passed before the election closes in, Timms stated that he has no way of knowing. This may be in part due to the fact that if the Tories win the election the bill would most likely be scrapped.
The main focus of the broadband tax is to fund companies in rolling out fibre optic broadband cables that would allow citizens? access to 100Mbit/s broadband connection speeds throughout all of the UK and not just in areas that Virgin Media and BT deem commercially viable.
Despite the public statements, the Digital Britain website blog which has an unknown author claims the tax will proceed as planned.
