BT has blamed telecoms regulators, such as Oftel, for holding back 100% UK broadband coverage by not rewarding risk-takers? That, we believe, means BT:

Verwaayen insisted that the final 10 percent of the population will not be able to enjoy broadband services without either public funding or a relaxation of regulations set out by Oftel and other European bodies. "It will be almost impossible to make the investments to take broadband to the last 10 percent, but that is unacceptable -- we have to get broadband to 100 percent of Europe," he said.

Verwaayen feels that BT is being punished by the regulators for being successful: "There is a tendency in Europe to say if you are big, there is some suspicion of you. If you are big and successful, the suspicion doubles. I want to have acknowledgement that broadband is a different environment to narrowband. This is not about the big ugly incumbent holding on -- that is the wrong picture," he added.

Interesting: "There is a tendency in Europe to say if you are big, there is some suspicion of you.". We don't think it's that BT, it's more to do with how dominant providers often try to 'control' their own market in an ‘anti-competitive’ way.

We’re sure it’d be a heck of a lot easier for any operator if there wasn’t competition =). So if it’s the wrong picture, we ask, what are they doing to change it? Most of the time the positive changes appear to be regulator enforced and not from the operator first. More @ ZDNet.