Well I personally think it is a good idea....
I know I will get flamed by the neo-liberals and capitalists here. In response, I say screw your values* along with your wizened hag mother and deluded father Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan.
Infrastructure should be at least partially state owned and state directed if not state run and this includes roads and rail as well as internet backbone. These people who think it is a bad idea should consider their moans carefully: If, philosophically, you think free market capitalism is the best platform for these projects then lets sell the roads and NHS too. How about the Army too? Or our nuclear deterrent? There are clear benefits to state run infrastructure and to not recognise them is ignorant in the extreme.
We have customers that have connection speeds of barely 2Mbs down on a good day with no hope of anything better from any provider. I myself get 6Mbps and I count myself lucky. It took Openreach 5 1/2 MONTHS to install a phone line for us when we moved about 300 yards down the road. That was after I got my MP involved and complained to the head of BT personally.
I do recognise that some people bemoan the ability of state run organisations to do things 'efficiently' however this is down to the values and skills of the managers as opposed to who owns the business being run.
For example - do you think it wise, and good for the people of this country (and their pockets) for BT to pay BILLIONS of pounds to the Premier League? They could have put that money into better infrastructure rather than TV rights. Who want to see a bunch of grown men paid millions of pounds a year kicking a bag of wind around a grass patch?
Perhaps if the masses spent as much time considering other human beings as they did watching sports they might just become socialists, and we'd be in a much better place. Much like Noam said.
* I said screw your values, I did not say screw you. As a socialist I love you all.
