Posted: 25th Jan, 2008 By: MarkJ
Birmingham City Councillor Les Lawrence has called on broadband ISP's to help make the service more affordable to low-income families. Lawrence pointed to government figures showing there are 800,000 pupils without broadband access in their homes:
"21st century children and young people wishing to achieve economic wellbeing when they leave full-time education need to have the skills required by 21st century employers, including literacy, numeracy, communications and IT.
It is time that the suppliers of broadband internet connections look at ways that they can reduce the cost for families that have children and young people at home requiring internet access for academic studies. This will need an integrated up approach between the internet suppliers, the government, local authorities and IT charities to be able to drive down prices."
Its a fair point, yet one that perhaps ignores the already aggressive competition and low pricing between UK ISPs.
ZDNet's summary also notes that Birmingham is providing 2,000 school pupils with laptop computers, with plans to hand out a further 6,000 by the end of the summer term.