Chris Goodman

Fareham

Analyst

The Regulator seems to be failing to understand or appreciate that broadband is no longer a minority facility service, it is now a major part of the information and communication service and infrastructure. The high costs of two or three years ago may then have been reasonably justified in the small customer base. But today, with broadband serving a mass market, there is no genuine reason why the present high charges still prevail, be it cable broadband or ADSL on the telephone line. The Regulator should use his powers to drive down the costs and reduce considerably the cost of bandwidth to the consumer. Everything else in the ICT spectrum is dropping in price and gaining in quality and service and there is no reason why provision of broadband services should not follow this trend.

I envisage that the coming year should produce an uncapped 1Mb broadband connection for around £10 per month to the consumer, with either further price drops or bandwidth increases in the following years, thus enabling the scope of ICT and the internet to widen for the domestic user.