Labour: Free British broadband for country if we win general election Labour will today pledge to give the good folk of Britain free broadband by 2030 by part-nationalising BT - if the political party gets elected. Under the move, Labour has said it will integrate the broadband-relevant parts of the London-listed company into a new public entity, British Broadband. That includes its broadband …
never mind the next pie in the sky presented by all parties practically every day (it appears like they've entered a merry bidding war on who's going to provide the silliest promise). What is important perhaps is that those parties employ clever, very well paid people who tell the parties, which promises "work" to get the votes. So, these promises are - "tailored" and, most probably are a TRUE reflection of intelligence level of millions of voters who are going to be influenced by those promises and vote for the highest bidder. Idiocracy ahoy.
There's not all that much use taking all pre election promises seriously, as most are for the purpose of getting votes and will never materialise. If this wasn't the case then we would already have the bestest transport, healthcare, education, etc in the universe as that's what every party has promised before every single election I can remember.
On this basis alone, you have to admit it's quite a stunningly good headline grabber, and it's been amusing watching the response to it which can be fairly characterised as "It is outrageous and irresponsible to promise free things like this which would cost a fortune, unlike all the brilliant slightly different free things which we are promising which won't cost anything". Reading between the lines of some of the reactions by politicians, I also sense a slight bit of "damn, wish we'd thought of that one....".
Personally, I agree with a few other posters so far who have made the case that Openreach should really be taken back into public ownership, as it is effectively a poorly run state mandated monopoly anyway, little more than a compulsory rent seeker.
I don't think that's true. In this case, Boris Johnson is not quite the loony right-winger that he's always been portrayed as. He's socially on the Cameroon wing of the party, and I think economically too - but he's always been considered more on the right because of the Europe issue. So obviously he's promising more spending, because he's planning so spend more. Which was clear from what he said when he first became PM. Whether they really think they can sustain that if the economy goes South is another matter - but then they also think that they want to avoid the economy going South by spending more.
As for Corbyn, he's a Bennite. He was on Tony Benn's deputy leadership campaign in 1981 (or was it 80?). He went into the last election on Miliband's manifesto, maybe because there wasn't time, or maybe so as not to frighten the horses.
But in this election the left have taken almost complete control of the Labour Party structure. I'm pretty certain that this election is going to be about what he believes. He's been a Brexiteer since the 1970s, and so he may be lying about that to stop the entire set of MPs from defecting - but it's not like any of these other views should be a surprise. His main advisors used to be members of the Communist Party! In the 1980s when there was no excuse for it - and all the horrors of communism were known.
"As for Corbyn, he's a Bennite."
{{Citation needed}} as the kids say these days. Corbyn has spent decades proving that he'll say anything for money. It's highly implausible that he has any political principles at all. The only consistent thread tying it all together is antisemitism, but there isn't even any sign that isn't just because antisemitism is lucrative.
Corbyn saying something doesn't mean he believes in it, it just means he thinks it benefits him to say it.
We saw with the expenses scandal just how flagrantly Corbyn is prepared to lie. And his supporters still insist the lie is true, even though it's a matter of public record - and has been admitted by Jezzer - that it is diametrically opposed to the truth.
File under "Things That Aren't Going To Happen". For a start, to see this through Labour would have to win at least two - and probably three - consecutive General Elections *and* keep the policy intact despite "events, dear boy".
Not that it would matter which party promised it, it's an election after all and lies and false promises are all the rage.
Interesting how politics makes people shout for one team or the other and blinds them to the incompetence and self-serving heart of them all.
When the Emperor's New Baldness finally forces de Pfeffel and The Chump to fall from the Hollow Celebrity stage, others will step in and new crowds will Whoop, Whoop!
Labour web page on this announcement made a direct comparison with the success of FTTH rollout in S Korea.
But the seem to have missed reading up on the subject first.
http://www.infodev.org/en/Document.934.pdf
"Surprisingly given the Government’s extensive policy involvement in the ICT sector, the **majority of
funding for Korea’s broadband infrastructure projects has come from the private sector** rather than the
public sector. Overall, the Government invested more than $900 million US in the KII project. However
this is only a small proportion compared to the total investment of $33 billion overall (NCA). The
Government’s total budget for BcN is far smaller, at just $62 million, again a drop in the ocean compared
to the overall level of investment that will be made by the private sector. Investment"
Does anyone remember the GPO? I do - "A telephone sir? Certainly. That'll be December - next year - oh, and only installable next to your front door!"
Crikey, if we remained hostage to the GPO through the late 80s early 90s we'd still be connected by 56K modems! Thank god it was privatised!
I'm conflicted. When I bought a house in the mid 80's I was treated as not worthy to own a telegraphic connection without extensive vetting, signatures and payment in advance, even though the line and phone were already installed.
But I also knew some folks who worked for the GPO/BT at the time, excellent and conscientious engineers who worked very hard and gave fantastic customer service. They were made redundant.
You're right, you can't turn back the clock.
While upgrading the national broadband infrastructure is needed, and openreach should probably be spun off from BT to become a separate company. I don't think offering free broadband to everyone is necessary and a good way of spending public money. I would not want to go from the situation we have now of dozens of ISP to choose from to supply your broadband just having one state run ISP, which is what would happen if there was universal free broadband, as how would the likes of Virgin, Sky, Cityfibre etc compete?
It another promise made by politicians that will probably never materialise anyway even if Labour do get into power. And no doubt even if it was nationalised it would be privatised as soon as the Tories got back into power anyway.
This is the most fatuous of any of the numerous fatuous plans I've heard from politicians.
Remember the three-month wait for a phone line? The cast-iron modems that cost more than a week's wages? Remember the paragons of efficiency like British Railways? When I made this point to a colleague today, he said, "But they were starved of investment". That's OK, then, because nationalised industries are never starved of investment these days, are they?
And the cash for all this is going to come from taxing IT multinationals (today's version of the Magic Money Tree). If getting billions from Amazon and Apple and Google is so easy, why aren't we doing it already?
There are of course companies like city fibre, virgin etc who provide fibre, presumably they would have to buy them/their networks too?
Not to mention (you'd think Prescott would have been on the blower) KCOM which provices FTTP in the Hull area which has never been and is not a BT area.
Don't so much care if Broadband is nationalized or not, but can we just have ONE trench for all the utilities and if multiple utilities need to dig the road, they all do it together? Less roadworks, less temp lights (don't get me started) and less patchwork road surfaces!
It's even been suggested that these trenches should be migrated to be under pavements - nice but VERY long term ambition - unfortunately Tories considered it but was last with Failing Grayling...
There's no way the economics of this investment work if you run it at a loss, let alone writing off the capital cost. Australia's NBN had to be heavily scaled back from full FTTH just to make it possible for twice the cost estimated. At least they stuck to the wholesale natural monopoly element.
I doubt they could do the whole of the UK for £15 billion. Taxes will have to rise to pay for it long term, or other services will be cut. I guess that is consistent with a "tax and spend" philosophy some left-of-centre parties espouse.
Given the levels of trust and competence in the public sector right now, is bigger government the right direction, or is re-building the competency in more reasonable, targetted and essential areas the way to go?
Also, where does free broadband leave any other business that's invested in this space, like mobile phone operators?
Just another nutty socialist idea from the nutty socialists. Stripping away the 'tradition' voters who vote a party because their family always has, that labour has any supporters beyond that shows nothing more than a failing of the education system to explain socialism.
However in this money pissing match the Tories also want to spend big. Where have the right wing gone? Or even a libertarian option? Small government, free markets, the right to be a free person unmolested by the anal retentive?
If those MPs were so responsible, why did they fight tooth-and-nail in Parliament for do-or-die remain, and not attempt to vote for a sensible compromise that everyone could live with?
If there had been fewer people campaigning for a second referendum, and voting down everything else, they wouldn't have got what they wanted - but they might have got us to something like Single Market membership. Which I think is a compromise that most voters could live with.
But that died in the joys of voting for unreastic things like eternal delay to any decision and extensions of the Article 50 process with no even vague suggestion of why.
OK, I admit that neither main party's leadership helped. But May even went back to the House for indicative votes to see if people would compromise, and they didn't. This attempt to claim that one set of people are the "sensible / clever / honourable" ones and everyone who disagrees isn't - is one of the main things that's caused the polarisation in politics. And that's as much the fault of people like Ken Clarke (who I'm otherwise a big fan of) as it is Rees Mogg.
Fred Dibnah,
May's deal strongly implied some sort of strong customs arrangement. It was what she was negotiating for and was the idea of the whole UK backstop - that if the EU wouldn't agree any deal that let NI leave the EU customs union then the whole UK should stay in some sort of arrangement - which also kept a lot of industry happy. And would involve a lot of continuing regulatory alignment between the UK and the EU. Basically as close to membership as May could get without accepting Freedom of Movement.
As far as I can see it, and everything May said and did from her speech at the 2016 party conference onwards was pretty much consistent with this, her two principles were dumping freedom of movement and being able to do independent trade deals. She was after the closest future arrangement she could get that allowed both of those - hence the Chequers deal, and the various shades of customs agreement she tried to get.
My reading of the post referendum polling (unreliable because most people are very unsure about hypothetical polls so you get loads of "don't knows") is that most people wanted to get rid of freedom of movement. A large minority of remain voters included. I think it was about 60-65%. But similar numbers also wanted to keep Single Market access. When polled about choosing one or t'other there was a decent majority for keeping FoM and staying in the Single Market. So even though May didn't see that, had there been a big move from remainer types to coalesce round that as a compromise, more moderate leavers like Johnson and Gove (and large chunks of the Conservative party) would be happy - as would quite a lot of moderate remainers (i.e. most of the rest of Tories and quite a lot of Labour).
The problem was that with Brexit faltering a large number of politicians on the remain side decided to go all out for the win, and having a second bite of the referendum cherry. This destroyed May's premiership - and her deal was so shit that it polarised opinion still further. Rather than Brexiteers mostly saying, "oh well it's too hard" a bunch decided that if no acceptable terms for leaving were on offer - then we should go the whole hog and hard no-deal Brexit. Hence a tiny group of MPs (the ERG and the "Spartans"), with fewer than 60-70 people would have been the only ones getting what they wanted. And make no mistake, no-deal Brexit was looking increasingly likely - by miscalculation rather than design - but we couldn't keep going on extending the deadline - yet not even voting the hold a second referendum so that was always going to take 9 months to organise, which was too long for an extension.
Whereas if enough soft Brexit and remain MPs had voted for full Single Market access in the indicative votes - then May might have gone off and negotiated that. Which would be much easier to do.
People went for the high risk winner-takes-all approach. On both sides obviously, as that was clearly what Johnson was going for with his divisive tactics as PM - and May's deal could have got through with the ERG hard-Brexiteer types too. But I think that's why this Parliament deserved to be put out of our misery.
Personally I don't think remaining in the EU is a viable option, after voting to leave it. Not unless there's massive changes, which there's no appetite for. The Brexit Party wouldn't go away, and some future Conservative government in 5-10 years time could just win and take us out, citing the unfulfilled referendum result. There's a good chance of another major Eurozone crisis in the next recession, or the one after - the structural problems of the Euro have barely been touched. And there'd be an awful lot of betrayed Brexit voters complaining about every minor foible of the EU. Hard Brexit will entrench a small (ish) group of very unhappy remain voters too - though I suspect there's fewer of them, at least a third of voters have wanted to leave the EU since the 70s (though I think numbers dipped in the mid-80s) - Single Market membership with some policies to address the issues created by freedom of movement could have been a nice sweet spot that upset everyone the least.
Johnson's deal will be a less close relationship (a direct consequence of the choices made by remain campaigners) - Labour winning would be highly unpredictable. They want us to join the Customs Union but have co-decision or veto over EU trade policy - something Norway, Switzerland and Turkey haven't been allowed. I can't see them getting very much, then who knows how their second referendum would go, when they came back with May's deal again, with a slightly reformed backstop.
Anon,
All politics is about compromise. See my post above. When you hold out for everything you want, you often get nothing. In first-past-the-post systems you have big parties comprising groups of people with different views - who've made their compromises pre-election. So the voters know roughly what to expect in advance, but smaller single-issue groups of voters get much less influence.
In more proportional systems you get small parties, and much more chance for the electorate to vote their actual beliefs (without being forced into tactical voting) - but the outcome is way less predictable and comes down to the post election horse-trading.
In neither case does anyone get what they want without compromise. I voted for Brexit hoping for something like the Norway option, expecting that the more remain politicians would coalesce around that as the least-worst option. We nearly got a no-deal Brexit, which only about 10-15% of the electorate (and MPs) wanted - now it looks like we're on for a Canada free-trade deal style Brexit, which is a compromise I can live with, but many other soft-leavers would prefer remaining in the EU to.
So be careful trying to portray the people you disagree with as the "nasty" ones who won't compromise. In post-referendum polling about 65% didn't want Freedom of movement, similar numbers wanted Single Market access - and when put to the choice it was about 55-60% for staying in the Single Market. With only 60-odd hard leave MPs and 450-odd remain voting ones (out of 650) you'd have thought that a Parliament much more remain dominated than the population (but with 80% elected on "leave" manifestos in 2017), would have jumped at the chance of the Single Market compromise position. May and Corbyn are both unsuited to compromise though and were given little help to become so.
Purely anecdotal, and a tiny and extremely biased sample, but FWIW....
I've been out canvassing for, ahem, a well-known political party five times in the last few weeks. It's an affluent area on the fringes of outer London where suburbs break up into small home counties towns. Observations, not just mine but others who have longer experience canvassing the area:
1. The Labour vote has collapsed outside traditional core heartlands. Middle class Labour voters are few and far between.
2. A lot of people really don't like Johnson. A lot of people really don't like Corbyn.
3. The traditional centre party squeeze effect on Lib Dem support seems to be running more strongly than usual, apart from strong Remain supporters. My guess is that both Lab and Con leaders are further from the centre than usual, and that this strengthens floating voters' impulse to run back to the perceived safety of their original home. (The "don't vote Lib Dem or you'll let in Boris / Corbyn" effect.)
4. Counter-balancing that is a LOT of "Well, normally I vote Labour / Conservative, but I really don't like Corbyn / Boris". In this (safe Conservative) constituency, the outcome of (3) Vs (4) is where we find how big the Conservative majority is.
5. Immigration is hardly coming up at all on the doorsteps.
6. "Sick and tired of the whole lot of them" would probably be a landslide winner if it was on the ballot.
7. People are mostly quite nice. Been wishes "good luck" and had sympathetic remarks about the cold, etc, from supporters of all parties and none. Which is nice.
The only prediction I'll make is that, regardless who wins, a law banning video doorbells would get widespread cross party support! Bloody things... ;)
A BT spokesman said: "It should be a top political priority to super-charge the roll-out of full fibre broadband and 5G right across the UK so we can build the digital economy of the future"
Fixed that for you.
"It should be a top political priority to pay us from the public purse to roll-out something close to full fibre broadband and 5G right across the UK so we can build the digital economy of the future and charge a ridiculous amount every month for it".
There's an awfully strong connection between the danger then and the danger now.
https://www.thejc.com/comment/leaders/to-all-our-fellow-british-citizens-1.491812
In 70 years the British Nazis have tried dressing in Nazi gear, as skinheads, as 'nationalists', and many other disguises, but none of those ever fooled British voters. Sadly they've now discovered that wearing a red rosette works, at least on hard-core Labour supporters. We can only pray they can't fool enough others in this election.
“Zionist conspiracy”???
No and putting words into people’s mouth is the very problem.
no “conspiracy” *You* are dumping words not even used, to twist and colour the original point. The definitive strawman.
I mention semitism and Zionism are two separate concepts, with an article supporting the point. there is no mention at all of conspiracies until *your* comment. *You* are colouring it with *your* prejudices and biases.
One is about race and is wrong, the other is about geography and politics.
Racial prejudice is wrong, geopolitical discussion is not. There can be people who agree with both, neither or one of them.
Of those, the ones who agree in racial prejudice, the specific variant here being anti semitism, are WRONG. No question.
But Those who question the borders of Israel/Palestine are not different from those questioning the borders of Kurds/Catalan/Rohingyas/Kashmiris. Questioning borders and a country’s war actions when there is disagreement is NOT WRONG.
There is nothing special or privileged about Israel’s border dispute versus all the other border disputes, involving ethnic identities, all around the world.
The prejudice to *any* ethnic identity is wrong, Palestinians too.
By your logic, by not allowing discussion of Israel’s borders and action, as one does with ANY other nation state, you would defacto be anti Palestinian and thus racist and an Islamaphobe, by your very logic, and thusIslamphobia is some a Palestinian ”conspiracy”. This is absurd. I don’t believe in conspiracies and nonsense like you mention.
If your logic does not work on the side you don’t agree with, it doesn’t stand.
Come up with unprejudiced arguments to support your case, and don’t throw strawmen and red herrings. No conspiracies and tin foil nonsense.
I am not supporting Corbin, but that article comes across as written with prejudice, but on the other side, which is just as bad. That article does not contribute to a balanced discussion, and fails to make the case it is trying to.
Fight prejudice in all its forms, but not by showing it.
Not rant, but what triggered it? Your prejudice Dave.
Labelling any disagreement with loaded terms is veiled censorship.
You’ve lost all credibility. Don’t agree will male genital mutilation. Anti Semitic. Don’t agree with the killing of Palestinian civilians, anti Semitic!
At this rate, if I don’t speak Hebrew anti Semitic...
Identity politician you are.
I only have have myself to blame in trying to engage in constructive discussion with a troll.
Since privatisation, £54billion has been paid out in share dividends.
And if they hadn't had the cash from the share sales they'd have had to borrow the money for investment from the banks. That would have paid out a lot more than £54b, but to bankers not to ordinary folks & pension funds.
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