Gov Climate Advisor Says, Switch UK Road Funding to Broadband

The CEO of the UK Government’s independent Climate Change Committee (CCC), Chris Stark, has called on MPs to consider switching funding from the £28bn pot for building new roads (intended to help relieve congestion) and instead invest it in helping to roll-out “full fibre” broadband ISP networks across the country.

According to CCC’s boss (here), switching such investment to broadband would be cheaper, better for the economy and more climate-friendly. Mr Stark goes on the suggest that the impact of the COVID-19 (Coronavirus) crisis, which is forcing many people to work from home for the first time, has helped to educate a nation and its businesses into recognising what is possible from remote working, without needing to travel.

The comments are similar to those made by the President of the AA, Edmund King, who earlier this month suggested that “in future, we should invest more in broadband because what this current crisis has shown is that the majority of companies can continue working from home, and it can be more efficient.”

At present the UK Government already plans to invest £5bn – focused on helping those in the final 20% of hardest to reach premises – to ensure that “gigabit-capable broadband” (via full fibre, cable / DOCSIS, 5G etc.) is able to cover every home by the end of 2025 (here), which is on top of various existing investment schemes and other support structures (here).

Chris Stark told the BBC:

“The government mustn’t be investing in anything likely to increase carbon emissions. I expect that video conferencing will become the new normal, and we won’t return to travelling the way we did.

I would spend the roads budget on fibre. You would get a huge return to the economy with people having better connections.

You would save people’s time and increase their productivity.”

Naturally, given our focus, we’re hardly going to object to the idea of ploughing more funding toward broadband (similar arguments have been made before about the dramatically over-budget HS2 project), although it’s presently unclear what more Mr Stark expects could be achieved with such a funding boost (vs the existing 2025 goal). We don’t even have a clear framework for that 2025 goal yet or know the full impact of COVID-19 on build pace, so it’s a little hard to judge.

On top of that it’s still far too early to know what the lasting impact of the COVID-19 crisis will actually be, particularly in terms of remote working and related productivity vs the office environment. Certainly it seems sensible to assume that we’ll see more home working going forward, but idealism is no substitute for hard scientific analysis and that can only really be done once we’re out of the current mess.

Furthermore working from home might help to take more cars off the road and reduce the need for such travel, but it won’t stop the use of roads as they remain essential for more than just work; likewise many tasks simply can’t be done remotely (e.g. plumbing, electricians, construction, deliveries). We might end up seeing a reduction in congestion, but congestion will still exist and roads will still be needed, not to mention maintenance.

Equally if we’re talking about funding then there may be some merit in establishing a Government funded initiative to help develop or promote software and systems to boost the take-up of remote working solutions. We can also see room here for some consideration of tax breaks or other incentives to help businesses adapt, which might be a faster approach to foster a more permanent change.

In the meantime the country and its workforce are about to face a colossal economic shock, which is almost certain to drive attention toward much more immediate considerations and challenges. After all, working from home is great, where possible, but you can’t do that without having a job in the first place. If any of that £28bn fund does get diverted then it’ll probably be needed to help stop the economy falling further into a black hole.