INCA comes to Manchester
29 June 2009
Over the last few months, the Community Broadband Network (NGA) has organised a series of six regional events sponsored by Alcatel-Lucent and designed to examine how local communities can develop schemes to provide next generation access (NGA). The events have been held in Gateshead, Nottingham, Bristol, Birmingham, Basingstoke and Manchester.
On behalf of the Communications Consumer Panel, I have spoken at four of these events, outlining a study we have carried out tracking the 40 or so local initiatives on next generation broadband (PDF 56KB, opens in a new window). The Manchester conference - the last in the current series - was held last week and was the most up-beat of the enthusiastic events.
The main reason for the excitement was the recent publication of the Digital Britain Final Report. As one speaker put it: "Digital Britain has changed the landscape". He said of the NGA debate: "It's leapt forward a long way".
Lord Carter - who produced the report - was not able to be present but recorded a video speech for the conference. His report recommended that investment in NGA in the 'final third' of the country be encouraged by the levying of 50 a month on all users of fixed lines and this is a proposal which has been supported in a statement by the CBN.
The Digital Britain Final Report gives encouragement to local NGA schemes but rightly calls for common technical standards and inter-operability. For this purpose, an initial £150,000 has been made available for a new organisation called the Independent Networks Cooperative Association (INCA) and INCA was officially launched at the Manchester conference.