All UK homes to get 'super-fast' broadband

Every home in the UK will have access to "super-fast" broadband by 2020, according to Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Internet access is the electricity of the digital age

Related Articles

• Chancellor: Broadband upgrade 'essential' to economy
• Ofcom: BT must open up network to other ISPs
• Government scraps £6-per-year broadband tax
• Broadband tax scrapped in emergency budget
• BBC Licence fee to replace broadband tax

The government has already pledged to offer super-fast internet connections to 90 percent of the country by 2017, as part of the Digital Economy Bill, paid for by a 'broadband tax' - a £6 per year levy on telephone lines.

Now, Brown has revealed it will take just three years to ensure the remainder of the country also has access to the service.

While Brown did not elaborate on the speed of "super-fast broadband", he did say it is "the electricity of the digital age" and "must be for all - not just for some".

"We can allow the market to provide a solution on its own terms and according to its own timetable. The result would be super-fast broadband coverage determined not by need or by social justice, but by profitability," Brown said in a speech.

"The alternative is our vision: ensuring, not simply hoping for, universal coverage."

Brown also said faster broadband speeds would bring "new, cheaper, more personalised and more effective public services to people".

The Conservatives, however, have slammed the 'broadband tax'.

Instead they believe the BBC should set aside some of the licence fee to pay for the roll-out of faster broadband.

• Broadband speed test
• Internet & broadband news

See also: Gov't group to oversee roll-out of 100Mbps broadband