British Tax to Spur Broadband Growth

September 23, 2009 -

In order to drive the development and implementation of “superfast broadband” throughout the country, England is set to introduce a tax on every phone line in the country.

According to the Daily Mail, Stephen Timms, Minister for Digital Britain, is attempting to initiate the levy ahead of the next elections. Digital Britain is the British government’s “strategic vision for ensuring that the UK is at the leading edge of the global digital economy.”

The tax calls for a 50p per-month, or £6-per-year (approximately $9.82 a year U.S.), additional charge on all phone lines. It’s estimated that the tariff could raise between £150 million and £175 million (approximately $245 million to $286 million U.S.) a year.

The British government defines “superfast broadband” as the transfer of over 40 megabits per second.

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Comments

Re: British Tax to Spur Broadband Growth

Submitted by ZAR on Fri, 09/25/2009 - 01:47.

Classic strategy! First you sell off telecomunications to companies (without demanding any guarantees). Since those companies don't invest anything into the infrastructure (hey, they want to make profit nothing else), the tax payer now has to pay TWICE. A classic sketch from Spitting Image: "Prime minister, British Telecom was useless and it STILL is useless!" - "So, privatise it AGAIN!" - "But it didn't work last time!" - "We clearly didn't privatise it enough!" - "So, what you say is, if something is particularly useless you have to privatise it TWICE! That means we have to privatise Lawson's* THREE times!" ZAR. (*Nigel Lawson - key proponent of the Thatcher Government's privatisation policy)

Re: British Tax to Spur Broadband Growth

Submitted by killatia on Thu, 09/24/2009 - 07:47.

Nice ideal but isn't Vats already a pain for the UK?

http://www.magicinkgaming.com/

http://www.killatia.com/

Re: British Tax to Spur Broadband Growth

Submitted by State on Wed, 09/23/2009 - 17:55.

Stealth tax. Paid by the public the tax will go to the government, no doubt about that, but used as funding for new broadband lines? Highly doubtful.

Re: British Tax to Spur Broadband Growth

Submitted by GoodRobotUs on Wed, 09/23/2009 - 18:05.

Agreed, that's my problem with it, the odds are highly unlikely that more than a few pence will go towards our Telecommunications. What was the point of privatizing the phone industry if we are still footing the bill for expansion and upgrade?

That's why I'm dropping BT and sticking to Skype. On my Broadband.

Re: British Tax to Spur Broadband Growth

Submitted by ZippyDSMlee on Wed, 09/23/2009 - 16:46.

Lets hope they make sure the fraking ISP(s?) don;t run off with the money like they did in the us.....

Until lobbying is a hanging offense I choose anarchy! Stop supporting big media and furthering the criminalization of consumers!! http://zippydsmlee.wordpress.com/

---

http://zippydsm.deviantart.com/

Re: British Tax to Spur Broadband Growth

Submitted by Cerabret100 on Wed, 09/23/2009 - 15:48.

I'm assuming the companies using the phone line pay? it's an interesting idea, but i'm curious how other politicians will view it.

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