As many of us expected, Alistair Darling today gave the controversial 50p phone tax the green light as part of the Government’s plans to “revolutionise” the UK’s broadband network.
As reported today, the government will try to raise £175m by levying a £6 annual tax (plus VAT) charged on all landline phones – whether they are being used or not. This will allegedly pay for the faster broadband for those who don’t currently have it.
We think this tax is an unfair, regressive and wasteful way of funding superfast broadband which would deliver less benefit than it will cost, slow superfast broadband roll-out and drive around 200,000 homes off broadband.
If this or any future Government does think that spending public money on providing universal superfast broadband is a good use of people’s hard-earned money and it is found that the market can’t meet that need then it should be funded, like any other national infrastructure project, out of general taxation, not by taxing the less well-off who use landline phones to subsidise the relatively wealthy who want high speed access to the internet.
According to the Telegraph, The Tories say the government should conduct an economic impact assessment into the phone tax over the impact of the levy on the least well off.
Jeremy Hunt, the shadow culture secretary, said: “The phone tax is misguided, dangerous and unnecessary, which is why we have pledged to scrap it. The Government’s own figures suggest that this tax will make the internet unaffordable for hundreds of thousands of people and will especially penalise low-income families. This makes a complete mockery of Gordon Brown’s boasts today about promoting universal access.”
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Jeff Culshaw
If people can’t afford just 11.5p a week extra then they already have problems unconnected to this and this tax is the least of their worries.
It is a good idea in my opinion as its the people who use the service who are paying. Taxing everybody, including people who don’t use the service as you suggest is ridiculous.
Ollie
This ‘tax’ is a complete disgrace.
How can the government expect everyone to just hand over extra money to them, without getting anything back in return, just so they dont have to spend as much of thier own funds providing broadband to remote places.
Seriously, if i live in the middle of nowhere and want broadband, then i would expect to pay more to cover the cost of providing it, but i dont, i chose to live near an exchange. So why should i pay for the people who dont.
Not only that, what most people dont realise is that VAT is charged on that 50p a month, so the government is making money out of us. Probably explains why they are so desperate to push this through.
We arnt expected to pay more if we are on an LLU connection to cover the line rental of people who arnt, and im certainly not prepared to pay extra because the government doesnt want to spend thier money!
kieran
Forcing those outside of immediate reach of the technology to pay for the connections of others that will get it within the first year of startup. Once they get the fibre, they won’t cast a thought for those stuck in the slow lane. And also, where is the content that will make use of these 100mbit speeds. youtube goes upto 3.5mbps, iplayer is similar too.