Digital Britain - not enough for small businesses

The government has, if you believe governments, committed itself to universal access to broadband. But what kind of broadband? Think about this - the commitment is to help us to get to the stage where we have 2Mbit/s by 2012 - not now, but in three years. Is that ADVERTISED or ACTUAL and what does this say about the government's commitment to small businesses? As a (very) recent survey by the FSB shows, most small businesses have two to four computers using the internet and more than 60 per cent of those who responded (6,000+ responses I may add) said they thought the figure should be a minimum of 8Mbits/. 

Is 8Mbit/s such an impossible task? I live out on the sticks and on a headline figure of 8Mbit/s I manage to get 6Mbit/s on a daily basis. On the other hand I have a little place in Spain in the country and we have a wireless connection there - which gives a reliable 512Kbps - and I can confirm that trying to do anything serious with such speeds is like having your arms removed. One large Powerpoint download and that's my connection gone for several minutes - and as for a Microsoft update - well!!!

In our organisation we're constantly shunting large attachments all over the place and we're not untypical. You might argue that 2Mbit/s is four times faster - but if we set this as a ceiling, what will the REAL speed be like - probably a lost less and in three years’ time most of our files will be a lot bigger - and since when do people ACTUALLY get what's on the box? 2Mbit/s is too near the bone. I know business people now who are on the slower connections and they reckon trying to get any work done at certain times of the day is virtually impossible.

We live in exponential times and our data requirements are continuing to go up and up - in three years time, 2Mbit/s will be only marginally more useful than dial-up is now. Our backup requirements will go through the roof as storage expands and our data expands to fill the void. We need offline solutions and they need BANDWIDTH. Is this REALLY the best our rural friends (and some in the cities) can hope for? While the likes of Virgin plough ahead at offering broadband 10 or 20 times higher than this - when the bulk of people in city centres gain high speed over the next few years we're looking at a serious divide between the digital haves and have-nots.

Satellite alternatives are not the be-all-and-end-all while the cost of such systems seems to continue to be sky-high, meanwhile mobile coverage - at least outside of London - is pretty poor, as anyone who has taken a train from Newcastle either down to London or across country will tell you. I know it's anecdotal but I'm sure I get better coverage in France and Spain than I do here. There are times on the train when I want to take the mobile dongle and throw it out of the window.

We need an imaginative plan to bring everyone into the 21st century - and for my money - this isn't it.