BT has come out against the government’s proposal to finance the nation’s broadband coverage by taxing people. It also feels that even with the tax, the government will not be able to keep the project running.

At the London office of BT, director of the company’s strategy and portfolio wing, Olivia Garfield said that she was not convinced if the anticipated surcharge on broadband users will be adequate to bring fibre optic broadband to the entire country. She said that the government’s expectations of 100 percent coverage were not feasible. According to her, only 80 to 85 percent of the nation would be covered by that amount - click to compare broadband for up-to-date and accurate information on your ISP.

It was during that briefing that Garfield announced that BT had no role to play in drafting the levy. In fact, they had no idea of the broadband tax levy until they got wind of it just twenty minutes before the official Digital Britain report was due to come out.

To calculate how the Next Generation Fund is planning to divide the funding money between companies like BT and Virgin Media, BT has sought help from Ofcom. This lack of information about the Next Generation Access has also led to the Parliament to call for an investigation into its working. The Parliament wants to determine if the idea put forward by Lord Carter in the Digital Britain report has what it takes to provide broadband coverage throughout the nation.

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