Broadband tax included in pre-Budget report

[taff]

Broadband tax included in pre-Budget report


The Chancellor has formally annnounced plans for a broadband tax

The government's controversial broadband tax has been given the green light by chancellor Alistair Darling in his pre-Budget report.
The £6 a year levy will be imposed on all households with a fixed line phone.
The money made will be put into a fund to ensure rural areas of the UK do not miss out on super-fast broadband services.
Mr Darling said the government would provide super-fast broadband to 90% of the UK by the end of 2017.
Announcing the tax, Mr Darling said: "We are modernising the UK's digital infrastructure and, in the process, creating thousands more skilled jobs.
We have provided funding to help extend the opportunities of the broadband network to more remote communities. We now want to go further, so we can provide the next generation of super-fast broadband to 90 per cent of the population by the end of 2017."
Market-led approach
PRE-BUDGET REPORT DOCUMENTS


Documents in full [3.87MB]

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The broadband tax has attracted criticism from within the industry with some experts saying the fund will fall short of what is needed to provide fast broadband services to all areas of the UK.
The money is earmarked for the 30% of homes that experts think will be by-passed by commercial fast broadband plans.
It is estimated that the broadband tax would raise around £170m a year, which is some way short of BT's estimate of £5bn needed to provide super-fast fibre services to every UK home.
The Conservatives have vowed to scrap the tax if they win the next general election.
Shadow culture secretary Jeremy Hunt has been given the Conservative remit for broadband.
He has said the Conservatives will favour a market-led approach with public funds only considered once the market has taken broadband as far as it can.
Currently BT is committed to rolling out next-generation broadband to around 40% of the UK with Virgin Media offering speeds of up to 50Mbps (megabits per second) to around half of UK homes.



http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8403273.stm

[Nathz29]

Piss take, if the government didn't waste so much money on quangos, expenses, wars, bailing out bankers etc. They would be able to keep the countries infrastructure upto date with the huge amounts collected from the taxes they already collect from the populous. There is no guarantee that the monies collected will even goto broadband infrastructure, I'm damn sure my road tax isn't spent solely on the up keep and improvement of the road netwoek! Crap robbing cnuts

[diablos]

I've never had a home phone for years my mobile covers all my needs.

I'm ok then.

[Tommy J]

I'm buying a few thousand canisters of H2o and Oxygen before these arseholes start taxing that too.

[MsDG]

Yeah, I am wondering if you have cable and you fuck off the phone, but keep the broadband can you avoid this tax?

[Over Carl]

Piss take, if the government didn't waste so much money on quangos, expenses, wars, bailing out bankers etc. They would be able to keep the countries infrastructure upto date with the huge amounts collected from the taxes they already collect from the populous. There is no guarantee that the monies collected will even goto broadband infrastructure, I'm damn sure my road tax isn't spent solely on the up keep and improvement of the road netwoek! Crap robbing cnuts

Even simpler and even more direct - ask all those people who bought cheap houses in the country knowing they would be away from civilisation to fork out the dough.

[Eric]

The £6 a year levy will be imposed on all households with a fixed line phone.

Is this just a starting figure ? I'll guarantee by the time the work actually gets underway as is the same with any government project the costs will have spiralled and so will the 'Broadband Tax'. How will this be collected, or haven't they thought of that yet ?This is not about the sum involved, it is the principal of having another tax imposed on people.
For those in the country that do not have access to broadband through a landline there is always mobile broadband.

[B.I.G.]

Even simpler and even more direct - ask all those people who bought cheap houses in the country knowing they would be away from civilisation to fork out the dough.

Correct.When you buy a house there are advantages and disadvantages which are reflected in the price.This is know this when the house is bought.

I don't remember my father having to pay extra tax for having a landline telephone in the 70's so that the inhabitants of emmerdale or the likes could enjoy the delights of having a phone in their houses.

[pattikins]

The £6 a year levy will be imposed on all households with a fixed line phone.

Spread over a year £6 doesn't seem much, but in principle it does mean that there will be people who can't afford to pay for broadband who end up subsidising some rich banker's second or third home...it's just another form of poll tax

[TwoPlAnKs]

For those in the country that do not have access to broadband through a landline there is always mobile broadband.

My house is about 100m from the edge of a city and gets exemplary normal DSL broadband but diabolical mobile stuff, not even 3G. I think you can get some fancy satellite dish but the latency on those makes them a huge pain in the arse.

As I said I live near a City and I don't usually have much time for countryfolk expecting everyone else to foot the bill for them. We get loads of them here moaning about things like subsidised school busses and lack of streetlights in the middle of nowhere, and it really bugs me when they chose to live there. Even other things like Royal Mail are obliged to drive a van out to the middle of nowhere to individual houses, which drives up the price for everyone.

All that said though - this is 50p a month on a per-phoneline basis. It's hardly an outrage. It may get used for countryfolk at first but eventually they can reinvest it into central infrastructure for everyone as that needs to be updated. Internet is a utility now, it is an essential part of life and needs investment.

Also, as time goes on country areas are getting less and less remote. As the population grows and more people move there the infrastructure would be needed by all.

Don't really agree with it because it seems a of a stupid way of administering it, and like another stealth tax, but it hardly warrants the public outcry.

[super mike]

Internet ... is an essential part of life and needs investment.

No it is not. It does need investment though.

.... but it hardly warrants the public outcry.

Yes it does.

[ka$h]

How can this be a broadband tax? they are simply taxing the telephone network. What percentage of phonelines actually utilise broadband services? there are several words running round my head at the mo like thieving, robbing and bastards but it's already been mentioned that this is simply a tax for the masses that you can't get out of because you want the use of a telephone line (stealth!)

If we had a decent infrastructure in place already and this paid for the maintenance or future enhancements you wouldn't mind as much but as it is, we are being taxed for having a crap system!

[TwoPlAnKs]

I don't believe how out of proportion this reaction is. I'd estimate there are at most half as many phone lines as people in the UK, thats 25p a month per person. In reality, the figure is probably much much lower with something like 4 to a phone line which takes it down to 13p a person. I spent £1.10 on a 500ml bottle of water today, when I live in Scotland where we are fucking surrounded by lovely water. That wasteful laziness could have paid my share of the broadband tax for almost 9 months!

In the same announcement today, he announced he was increasing national insurance by 0.5%, or £3,000,000,000 (that's £2,820,000,000 more than the phone tax, even using my stupidly high estimate of one line per two people)

He's putting VAT back up by another 2.5% percentage points, or by 17%. If you spend £240 on VATable products in the whole of next year then that's cost you more than the phone tax for an entire phoneline.

Even on the national average salary, you'd pay at least £450 a month in income tax alone (that's 900 times as much, or 99,900% more)

[Over Carl]

I don't believe how out of proportion this reaction is. I'd estimate there are at most half as many phone lines as people in the UK, thats 25p a month per person. In reality, the figure is probably much much lower with something like 4 to a phone line which takes it down to 13p a person....

He's putting VAT back up by another 2.5% percentage points, or by 17%. If you spend £240 on VATable products in the whole of next year then that's cost you more than the phone tax for an entire phoneline.

The amount is not what I have a problem with, it's the reasoning behind it. I'm sure I will have posted here a few times when the VAT rate was cut to 15% that I thought it was a stupid idea and if anything it should have been put to 20% temporarily.

[flumperino]

How do they plan to collect this money?

[ka$h]

I don't believe how out of proportion this reaction is. I'd estimate there are at most half as many phone lines as people in the UK, thats 25p a month per person. In reality, the figure is probably much much lower with something like 4 to a phone line which takes it down to 13p a person. I spent £1.10 on a 500ml bottle of water today, when I live in Scotland where we are fucking surrounded by lovely water. That wasteful laziness could have paid my share of the broadband tax for almost 9 months!

In the same announcement today, he announced he was increasing national insurance by 0.5%, or £3,000,000,000 (that's £2,820,000,000 more than the phone tax, even using my stupidly high estimate of one line per two people)

He's putting VAT back up by another 2.5% percentage points, or by 17%. If you spend £240 on VATable products in the whole of next year then that's cost you more than the phone tax for an entire phoneline.

Even on the national average salary, you'd pay at least £450 a month in income tax alone (that's 900 times as much, or 99,900% more)

So you'll quite happily pay yours, mine and actually if it's not so much of an issue, you might as well pay the rest of the nations share.

My issue isn't the £6, two fancy twat bottles of beer in town would soon put pay to that. It's the principle of taxing something that isn't worthy of paying extra for. Saying that, we do pay road tax....... And in addition to that, when will it stop? it starts as £6 which already established isn't the end of the world but how long before it's £60 or even £600 pa???

[ka$h]

How do they plan to collect this money?

Sods law it'll fall into the council tax scam they run and it'll never see it's intended purpose.

[MsDG]

I don't believe how out of proportion this reaction is.

In 1928 the cost of petrol was a mere 6p per Gallon. Then they created fuel duty, and added a tiny 1.7p on top. I am sure that there were many that said similar things to you as they played with their Abacuses!

The problem is that they have opened up a new Tax avenue, which they start at a mere smiggin, with all the money going to the good of the countries broadband. However, how many budgets do you think it will take before someone realises what a great cash cow it could be?

Personally, I believe that the brains of Britons at Labour are just about to get a right royal but fucking over this idea. I mean i know loads of people out there who have land lines and cannot really think of a reason why (with mobiles). I am sure that the telecoms will be thrilled when users start dumping landlines left right and centre!

[Cooleo]

Please, Everyone pay it. I live in a rural area and need faster internet, Your helping out me

[flumperino]

Please, Everyone pay it. I live in a rural area and need faster internet, Your helping out me

lol....if you want mate, I'll send you a couple of paper cups and a really really really long piece of string