MILLIONS could be hit by a new “telephone tax” under government plans to fund broadband for all.<br /><br />Lord Carter’s long-awaited Digital Britain Report, published yesterday, outlined plans to slap a £6-a-year levy on households with a telephone line to help pay for universal broadband access.<br /><br />The TaxPayers’ Alliance last night said it was “inappropriate” to ask consumers to pay for a service, regardless of whether they wanted it or not.<br /><br />“It’s disgraceful to put another tax on people just for using the most basic of services,” said TaxPayers’ Alliance campaign manager Susie Squire. “It is not a lot of money. But it is yet another stealth tax and people will be unwilling to foot the bill”.<br /><br />And shadow culture secretary Jeremy Hunt called the tax an “old economy solution to a new economy problem”.<br /><br />Meanwhile, the BBC reacted angrily to plans to use the £200m-a-year it was given for digital switchover to fund regional news programming on commercial rivals such as ITV.<br /><br />And local newspaper owners will be disappointed that the report has not recommended the relaxation of merger rules, which could have led to scores of paper-saving mergers across the industry.<br /><br />There was also frustration that the report failed to provide a concrete solution to Channel 4’s funding problem.
Wednesday 17 June 2009 1:00am
Outrage as telephone tax looms
