All options on the table in UK broadband policy review

Stuart Corner
Thursday, 28 February 2008 15:54

Opinion and Analysis

The UK Government has just announced a review of broadband policy. The reasons given will be familiar to anyone in Australia who has been following the tortuous path of broadband policy development in this country for the past several years. But the approach is very different. You can read the announcement, from the UK Government's Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform here, but to sum up: the reasons for initiating the review are that high speed broadband reaching speeds of up to 100Mbps or more will be important to enable British businesses to make the most of new opportunities arising from rapidly developing technology and an increasing reliance on Internet services but there are a number of potential barriers to the mass roll-out of next generation technology and to content companies collaborating with those responsible for infrastructure.

So, the review will consider possible barriers to any new models of investment involving collaboration between telecommunications suppliers and between suppliers and content providers and will aim to identify potential solutions. It will examine whether the EU and UK statutory framework has given the regulator, Ofcom the necessary powers to establish a regulatory regime which will provide regulatory certainty for investors and sufficiently incentivise new investment in high speed access.

A key statement comes from the head of BERR. Shriti Vadera, who said: "We must not be in a situation where our creativity and growth of our businesses are stifled by inadequate communications and regulatory frameworks."

In other words, the review is going to question the entire telecoms regulatory framework. And it appears that the review is intended to completely bypass the current regulator in the UK. Eyebrows have been raised by the fact that Ofcom - which, as a generalisation, combines the access regulation administered by Australia's ACCC and the communications regulatory regime of the ACMA - has been sidelined and an independent figure, a former head of Cable & Wireless, has been named to head up the review.