Posted: 26th Feb, 2003 By: MarkJ
Over a hundred (one out of every five) members of parliament have officially called for the UK government and BT to further improve the rollout of broadband services for rural areas:
An Early Day Motion (EDM) on broadband access, proposed by Jim Knight MP in December 2002, has now attracted the support of 115 MPs -- with more signing up every day.
This motion urges BT and other telcos to give more information about when broadband will available to areas where it isn't currently on offer.
It also encourages government departments to work together to drive the rollout of broadband networks across the UK, and to help implement projects that offer "higher bandwidth than ADSL" in rural areas. Consumer ADSL packages typically provide a 512Kbps downlink but the technology can be much faster, as with Bulldog's new 4Mbps product.Not surprisingly the government and BT have defended themselves, insisting that they're doing all they can and are addressing the issues, which is at least partly true.
Here's to hoping that BTs extended reach ADSL, 256Kbps product and 16 users DSLAM trials continue and prove successful enough to rollout. More @
ZDNet.