Ofcom announces plans for a major reform of Openreach

[Defiant]

Anyone that thinks the state will do a better job than the shockingly bad one BT/Openreach are doing needs their head examining. Who likes paying for for the same or a worse service?

This is just fashionable thinking because of the grass is greener effect

I'm going to disagree with you on this, considering we have a pretty much national copper phone line network in the UK which was done when BT was state owned. After BT was sold off and the advent of the internet BT have not been interested in providing for the masses as there is not enough profit in low density areas so that they can recoup their upgrade costs.

I'm happy to discuss if you have evidence to the contrary. Also you can structure public bodies in such a way that the state is at arms length and the new body has the ability to properly fund the body from services it provides, it just needs to be structured right.

[outwar6010]

I wish ofcom would do something about crappy isps who are constantly throttling their users!

[Syphadeus]

BT gets paid for services provided by BT (internet, TV, etc) while the line rental already goes to Openreach. BT gets a discounted rate from Openreach (welcome to the bizarre world of internal IT costing) but money for infrastructure still flows from BT to Openreach. If Openreach were separated, BT's per-user payments would be larger, but that infrastructure flow would cease. That's fine for operational costs, but not so much for expansion and replacement which is what is sorely needed.

That may well be the case - but how is it any different now except for the fact that the huge government wad of money they got seems to have all but evaporated?

In 2015 BT Group posted operating profit of 2.15 billion pounds. This year they've put up their prices which they say is so that they can continue investing in the network. How's that? Their massive operating profits should be enough by itself to guarantee sustained service levels and infrastructure improvement.

The thing is, as a for profit company it is looking after it's own interests. It doesn't matter to BT whether they've got one of the worst reputations for customer service, or that Openreach is managed diabolically. It doesn't matter to them that a lot of people pay top whack and get abysmal internet speeds. What matters is that they've got a lot of money to pay shareholders their dividends. Or that they've got enough set aside to pay the ridiculous amounts of money required for rights to premier league football and other sports coverage costs them.

If it's a privatised company that's operating on a for-profit basis - and by extension encompasses Openreach - then they should have been completely ineligible for any government money or else been held to ransom for results following taking the money. Neither of which has happened.