Labour Party Promises Mandatory Social Broadband ISP Tariffs
The UK Labour Party has proposed a new policy that would, if they won the next election, see them introduce a mandatory “industry-wide” social tariff for cheaper broadband (available to those on benefits). On top of that, they would also stop mid-contract price hikes by ISPs and reduce early termination charges for contract leavers.
At present a growing number of ISPs already offer cheaper social broadband tariffs to those on state benefits (see below) and take-up is improving (i.e. 136,000 homes have taken such a package), but that’s still just 3% of those eligible. The biggest obstacle to adoption of such tariffs is currently the lack of awareness by consumers and poor advertising by ISPs.
However, Ofcom has thus far stopped short of enforcing an industry-wide regulated social tariff (doing this would also require a direction from the Government), which is perhaps partly because they still see plenty of scope for the self-regulatory approach to improve. On top of that, the market is chocked full of smaller ISPs that may struggle to introduce such a tariff, particularly given the low margins nature of residential broadband.
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In any case, Labour’s new proposal is much more viable than their prior commitment to deliver “free full-fibre broadband to all by 2030” (here), and they also appear keen to ensure that wholesale providers like Openreach are part of the solution (i.e. so that the cost burden doesn’t rest solely with retail ISPs).
On top of that, Labour also suggested that they would ban mid-contract price hikes by broadband ISPs (likely to be a popular position), reduce the impact of Early Termination Charges (ETC) for those who exit their contracts before they’ve finished, and ensure wholesale price rises (e.g. from Openreach etc.) are cost-based rather than inflation (CPI) based to help balance the current concerns over annual price hikes.
Lucy Powell MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Digital, said (Guardian):
“Whilst the Conservatives crash our economy, Labour will ensure accessing and connecting to digital infrastructure powers growth across our economy to ensure people and places aren’t left behind.”
At the time of writing, Labour hasn’t furnished us with an official press release for all this and nor could we find one on their website, thus we’re unsure whether the party would also extend these proposals to include mobile network operators (right now the focus seems to be on broadband ISPs). We also think they may be missing an easy win by ignoring the calls for social tariffs to benefit from a tax (VAT) cut from 20% to 5%.
In addition, Labour also mentioned a desire to crack down on so-called loyalty penalties, where new customers get discounts that result in them paying significantly less than existing customers. But such discounts are a fairly normal part of any aggressively competitive market, and removing that freedom might be tricky.
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One other issue here, which Labour sadly hasn’t covered, is that not all ISPs are clear about how much you’ll pay post-contract when you first sign-up. Sometimes, even after you’ve gone through almost the entire order system, the provider still won’t tell you what the normal post-contract price is. Such details are often consigned to the convoluted small print at the bottom of their product pages instead. We’d like to see this tackled too.
At this point we should highlight that not all providers adopt the same model and many smaller providers, which may also offer advanced features (static IP etc.), simply charge a set monthly fee that rarely ever changes – there’s plenty of choice around. A savvy consumer could also try contacting their provider in an attempt to haggle for a lower price (Retentions Tips).
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
Sigh, this is yet another layer of bureaucracy: if Openreach has to offer lower wholesale prices for people on benefits then users will have to prove their benefit status to the ISP *and* the ISP will in turn have to prove it to Openreach.
Surely, if you want people on benefits to be £10 a month better off, then why not just put another £10 in their pocket? Then they can choose to spend it on broadband, or something else if they wish. If the government thinks that ISPs and Openreach ought to fund this, then tax them more.
The more extra goodies you get from being on benefits, the less likely you are to come off them. Suppose you get an offer of a short term job: not only do you lose your state benefits for that period, you lose all your extra goodies as well, and you have to reapply for them all later. There’s a very high incentive not to declare the job at all, or just to sit at home.
Same applies to tons of other things too of course, from free prescriptions to bus passes. All of these have to be applied for, and once you have them you won’t want to give them up.
(5 in 6 prescriptions are free anyway, so why not just make them free for everyone and cut out the bureaucracy? Increase income tax or NI to compensate)
True, I think all options should be put on the table when it comes to social internet tariffs.
Not true, as already mentioned here: https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2022/08/gov-make-it-easier-to-verify-eligibility-for-cheap-broadband-social-tariffs.html
Those who are eligible for social tariffs do NOT need to prove their entitlement to their ISP as there is already a system in place which allows the ISP with the customer’s permission to verify directly with the DWP their entitlement.
Therefore there is NO need to introduce more bureaucracy as you mistakenly believe there needs to be.
This is a good idea from Labour specifically the mid contract price hikes but they could build on that to include mobile contracts from the likes of EE, Vodafone, VMO2 and Three too.
It is a finely balanced discussion about whether benefits should be restricted to specific outcomes or not. Ranging from “free school meals for children” to situations such as above. Sometimes creating a specific benefit/discount is a useful nudge to better outcomes for the citizen, sometimes it is just “nanny state” (an example of the latter is the ways the US government gives “fiat money” to poor citizens which can only be spent on grocery–“food stamps”/Electronics Benefits card)
I would expect that the current DWP verification process is not straightforward for smaller ISPs to access; a better solution would be to move “benefits entitlement check” to a web based share code process same as is now used for DVLA license check and also right to work for non-UK citizens working on Visa, which is a much simpler web page/API call for the ISP and has a clear “permission giving” process (generate the share code online, put into the ISP’s ordering process, can only be used once). Repeat on a quarterly /annual basis to validate ongoing entitlement, or the first time through generates a token which the ISP can use monthly to revalidate entitlement.
A lot of Companies, Voxi being one I think of, use open banking to check for benefit payments in order to qualify – some find it evasive some don’t
Finally a labour policy that is worth supporting, getting rid of greedy price hikes. Too bad it’s bundled in with nonsensical garbage, as usual.
Want to make bills easier for people? Simply scrap VAT on all broadband just like all other utilities
Mandating private businesses to offer social tariffs (socialist tariffs), just further pushes providers away from areas with poor people. Clear cut case of a leftist policy with good intention designed to garner votes but in reality no brain power put into it
So you want lefty socialist interference in pricing where it suits you (banning mid-contract price hikes) but not where it might benefit others?
It’s all bad. It’s just bureacracy, and overhead and interference in a tremendously competitive market.
If you want a fixed tariff, then choose a provider that provides one. You might just find it’s not got the cheapest headline price.
A contract that states “we may increase the price if we want during contract and if you want to leave then you have to pay full anyway because firetruck you” should never be made legal in the first place. Imagine signing a work contract and the company puts a clause “we will lower your annual salary every year so we can make more profit”
I would switch if I could, but there’s no other provider. Not everyone has access to competition. In an ideal world everyone would have at least 2 providers but that’s not the case
That would be fine, but the contracts don’t say that, do they? Those where there have been out of contract price increases trigger a break clause where you can leave.
In my case, I signed up for a contract and immediately the next month I got hit with a huge price hike
I think people are missing the bigger story here. If Openreach lose the CPI linkage for regulated wholesale products, then the economics for anyone building fibre are drastically reduced and the fibre build will stop.
The CPI link was agreed with Ofcom as an incentive for OR to build fibre and to give give visibility of no regulated price changes until ‘31.
Who will invest in UK infra projects if the government tears up the rules half way through?
Hopefully the copper will do for those who don’t get fibre before the build stops
They’re basically the communist party so of course they promise this. They also promise total open boarders for the whole world to move her and everyone else pay for them to live here. Look at how Biden is running America, that is how The Labour Party will run the UK.
And of course the Conservatives are just lite British National Party as are the Republicans under Trump.
As to immigration, I can’t see how Cameron, May, Johnson and Truss have actually done anything to address the issue.
As to Biden, well least he’s not a compulsive liar who attempted a coup against his own Govt because he lost the election fairly.
If you really want to compare a party to the Communist Party, I suggest you look at the Scottish SNP Party.
“As to immigration, I can’t see how Cameron, May, Johnson and Truss have actually done anything to address the issue.”
There is a fundamental difference between saying “we don’t want people coming here” and trying to come up with ideas to stop and discourage them (i.e. Rwanda policy) that the far lefties all put every effort into thwarting as they want unlimited uncontrolled immigration to the UK. To a party saying “we want unlimited uncontrolled immigration to the UK if we get into power”. Like I say, under Trump America had its lowest number of immigration in decades. Under Biden its record numbers. But then its curious when DeSantis started bussing these migrants to Democrat neighbourhoods, these far lefty democrats phoned in the national guard onto those migrants to get them out of there fast. Its we want uncontrolled immigration, but not in our neighbours. Other peoples.
It’s crazy seeing leftists still believing the hoax that unarmed people taking selfies with buffalo horns, stealing furniture to sell on craigslist, after getting permission from the police to get in the capitol was anything remotely resembling a coup. Meanwhile record billion damage (including several govt buildings) during the 2020 summer of love they turn a blind eye
Remember the last general election where Corbyn promised to nationalize broadband? Labour is still that with communism at its core. India tried doing that and as a result it killed all the competition, once they figured out they can’t have free internet and started charging, suddenly people are paying big amounts for a very slow service
Is that a Daily Mail bot albeit one which can’t spell ‘borders’?
Hahahaha…
Well let’s see what a Professional Law Enforcement Officer has to say then and I quote:
The term domestic terrorism means activities that involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any state. And (b) appear to be intended to intimidate or coerce the civilian population, or to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion, or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping.”
Therefore as he explains below under oath I should point out so he can’t lie, those who were a part of the Jan 6th attempted coup are domestic terrorists which I would add in my own personal view that should also mean Trump is barred from holding any public office as it was his direct actions that caused the attempted coup.
https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1420061175602106375?t=B7LHTzrwKF_wngxHpxDeTw&s=19
Have a nice day
^Imagine quoting MSNBC, a known leftist propaganda outlet.
Trump will run in 2024 and fix the mess that Biden has put us all in, regardless of how much you NPCs cry. He has sued fake news CNN for slander, who has cut all of their sex offending propagandists: Jim Acosta, Cuomo, Brian Stelter, Don Lemon and hundreds of their woke staff. MSNBC will be next on the chopping block. Sane people are looking towards independent media and ditching corporate propaganda
“unarmed people taking selfies with buffalo horns”? Yeah sure, so the spear that one rioter was brandishing was nothing, the fact that the rioters were threatening to execute the US Vice President for only doing his job with Trump doing nothing and thus encouraging them.
In fact, one police officer who had to give evidence proved why it was domestic terrorism and was a attempted coup.
Add to the fact that the FBI has classed it as a domestic terrorism attack too with three police officers killed by the terrorists in the name of sizing power to keep Trump in power so yeah it was nothing but a love fest and none of that happened in the eyes of the deluded Trump supporters who should be banned from ever holding any public office for attempting a coup against the US Govt.
The FBI also said Trump was literally a Manchurian Candidate brainwashed by Russia to secretly do its bidding, while never actually knowing he was doing its bidding. While at the same time direct evidence came out from his sons laptop that Biden had been taking bungs from Ukraine and China to do their bidding that they dismissed as russian misinformation. Even to this day when its been showing the laptop contents were true. Not a thing will be said about the Biden family taking all these bungs.
Keep believing that a single guy with a spear would be able to take down the strongest economy in human history
The FBI has been a partisan political force ever since inception. Anyone wanting a bite size info on this can check Ben Shapiros video “What You Don’t Know About the FBI”
It is no surprise that they only take action against conservatives rather than dealing with actual dangerous leftist groups such as antifa or child castrating clinics
Pablo and Anthony etc keep on taking those mind bending drugs while the rest of us who don’t believe in myths or hoaxs get on with life.
Remember the memo from the DoJ that had the FBI investigating parents at school parents meetings. They were also labeled as domestic terrorists by the DoJ and FBI.
Anyways… back to ISP news eh ?
Again if you think a group of unarmed people… sorry one of them had a spear… a ground of unarmed people WITH ONE spear, were close to overthrowing the strongest government in the history of mankind and halfway through decided to just go home instead then you’re the one who fell for a hoax.
Keep reading the guardian/independent/sky news and believing everyone else is on drugs
Marvel should make a movie about that man and his spear. As according to the Democrats he is stronger than Thor and his hammer with it.
^ that marvel movie of the maga spear would get a far greater audience than Shehulk that’s for sure
The Labour party should make people aware that if your isp puts the price up during your contract then you can leave that isp anyway without penalty this is what Ofcom has said, Labour love grandstanding.
“Ofcom has said”
+ as long as that isn’t something you’ve agreed, i.e RPI etc,
Labour promises my tomato soup would be orangeyred and taste like Tomato..years after Tomato Soup came out..
Same story here. Already got a decent section and sure to grow.
Pardon for pointing this out as the gullible here won’t like it eg those right wingers who believe Trump can do no wrong and will “save” them from Biden but encouraging a attempted coup to seize power and then doing absolute nothing to ensure the safety of not only his own deputy – VP Pence but repeatly lying to Congress should bar him from ever being appointed to ANY public office.
Biden might be a bumbling fool but least he hadn’t tried yet to seize power, force Govt agencies to do his bidding nor has he incited a coup.
I’m not a leftist but rather someone who has common sense that Trump is not fit to serve as POTUS again in 2024 and shouldn’t even be considered for the criminal that he is.
The problem is, lefties believe these stupid terms they want to use. “Trump says on record and its recorded him saying it “Go and peacefully protest”. Lefty news outlets “oh my God he staged a coup”. Every lefty the world over. Trump should be banned from office for staging a coup. BLM smash up whole cities costing billions of pounds of damage. Reporters standing in-front of burned down cities still on fire “this has been fiery but mostly peaceful demonstration”. Far lefties. “wow those protests were the most peaceful in human history”. This is the problem they cannot think for themselves they thing what they are told to think.
Biden literally seized more power than any POTUS in recent history. Most executive orders, weaponizing public offices, the military, the IRS, the FBI which not only he has used against his opposition but he used the FBI to cover up for his son’s laptop which according to the polls would have changed enough votes to swing the election
He portrayed himself as a moderate that would bring unity, instead he just passed incompetent far leftist bill after far leftist bill blowing up the spending causing record inflation and branded half of the country as “the greatest threat to democracy since pearl harbour” while having a literal blood red background
Biden is the actual criminal, to the point that he’s now pouring record amounts of money to Ukraine to protect his son’s corrupt business there. Of course you leftists will believe whatever you read in your propaganda outlets
Broadband prices are not people’s headache like it is with the energy prices. We don’t really need social tariffs for broadband as the current prices are very much similar! The problem is not the prices of the broadband but the betrayal of the price promise contract!
You’ll find many broadband providers offer the same prices as social tariffs like that of BT Home Essentials but then they will jump from £20 to £30 mid-contract.
Labour should be concentrating more on how to stop ISPs or perhaps fine those ISPs like TalkTalk that violate the price promise guarantee. I was promised by TalkTalk over 2 years ago that my price will remain guaranteed for the next 24 months. But only the first 12 months or so the price remained at £21.75 a month and it then shot up to £25 and then £30, £36 and finally £40 after the 24 month contract had ended.
I suppose currently the only advantage with social tariffs is that you are not tied in a contract or won’t get price hikes. But we don’t need separate social tariff broadband packages for that!
We just need more honest contracts that don’t hike mid-contract. We also don’t need these 24 month contracts. If I am happy after 6-12 months and the service is good, why wouldn’t I not stay? I will remain loyal if the ISP is satisfactory and honest!
I’d also be happy if routers weren’t locked to ISPs. We don’t have to then invest in better routers or try to troubleshoot how to solve issues like with port forwarding, etc.
Customer loyalty should also be respected. I’m sure I would’ve remained with TalkTalk for longer than 2 years. But they are happy to abuse and price hike and then lose me as a customer. Even though I am still waiting for FTTP I would’ve at least remained with TalkTalk for a little longer for the time being.
At its core not a bad idea, self regulation can work to a point but the market doesn’t always work perfectly and sometimes it needs a nudge. Ensuring the social tariff is easy to access and doesn’t end up crippling smaller providers by ensuring openeach helps foot some of the cost does not seem unreasonable. Yes, they could lower the VAT rate on broadband and treat it the same as gas/electric/water. Arguably it is also an essential utility so really it should be. Also banning mid contract price rises makes absolute sense and I can’t see how anyone could complain about this, unless you are rolling in money, these are always painful so yes, let’s regulate those away.
As a side note: From a domestic security standpoint, having the national broadband backbone as a PLC does present a lot of risks from takeover/interference by proxies for unfriendly actors. I’m not just talking takeovers but also market manipulation creating instability / financial problems. Yes, there are mechanisms in place to protect infrastructure providers from takeover but not other forms of financial attack. So nationalising openreach would protect it and our infrastructure from this and enable wholesale prices to be better regulated.
I expected this comments section to be a car crash and the usual suspects didn’t disappoint.
I am fascinated by how it has become a discussion on Republican versus Democrat! Car crash!
Oh look, it’s our lord and savior and internet content moderator come to tell us what we can or can’t comment on or that we’re all numpties etc. Hail XGS dear leader.
I would like Labour’s policy to be a national requirement for ISPs to offer 1 year contracts to customers.
It’s not reasonable for ISPs to only offer 18/24 month contracts, there are many people (students and tenants) that this doesn’t work for.
Yep and we can all queue at the Government owned supermarket for our cabbage soup and stale bread.
It will put the price up for the rest of us. Why do the people that work get nothing and the people that don’t get everything?
I fully expect someone like XGS to come along now and tell me why i’m wrong/bigoted/nasty/whatever. The government seems to think if you earn 25k you’re loaded and don’t need any support during cost of living crisis. But unemployed alcoholic stoner? have some free internet my son.