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[Bowdon]

The Knives Come Out as BT Strikes Back at MPs Demanding Separation

Instead of going on a charm offensive BT’s CEO, Gavin Patterson, appears to have taken a more confrontational approach by privately writing to every (650) elected UK Member of Parliament and highlighting how he felt that many of their recent claims against the operator were “inaccurate and misleading“.

Broadband roll-out will be slower if you break Openreach up, BT chief warns MPs in private letters

Households across Britain will be forced to wait longer to get broadband access if BT Openreach is broken up, the firm’s boss has warned in private letters sent to every MP in Britain.

[Chrysalis]

the threats continue then

[Black Sheep]

............ and long may they.

Subject been done to death on the pro's and cons, and more than covered on the pit-falls of a split by Ignitionet, W3 and Kitz. GP would be remiss if he didn't attempt to put over to the MP's the FACTS as they stand.

[kitz]

In all fairness I dont blame them.   The report which those MPs put their names to was full of holes and inaccuracies. 

As regards to roll out will be slower if there was a split.   I thought that had been established as a fact rather than a threat.   
Even those who are pro-split acknowledge that the red tape that would be caused by a split (and Im not talking deliberate stalling) would cause a delay.
It is purely because of the resulting mess that what ensue after a split that I am in the 'dont split' camp.   I do not see how a split would bring benefit to the UK consumers.  There are other ways that short comings could be resolved.   If you watch the parliamentary debates on the subject, even the most anti-BT have admitted that it would tie BT up in paperwork for years.

[broadstairs]

In all fairness I dont blame them.   The report which those MPs put their names to was full of holes and inaccuracies. 

As regards to roll out will be slower if there was a split.   I thought that had been established as a fact rather than a threat.   
Even those who are pro-split acknowledge that the red tape that would be caused by a split (and Im not talking deliberate stalling) would cause a delay.
It is purely because of the resulting mess that what ensue after a split that I am in the 'dont split' camp.   I do not see how a split would bring benefit to the UK consumers.  There are other ways that short comings could be resolved.   If you watch the parliamentary debates on the subject, even the most anti-BT have admitted that it would tie BT up in paperwork for years.

In some ways I agree with you however the status quo is not acceptable. It needs fixing and in some ways I dont care how it is accomplished. This situation should NEVER have been allowed to exist in the first place.

Stuart

[Dray]

Openreach would be better owned by all the telcos - BT, TT, Sky, Vodafone, Virgin even.

[Weaver]

Ownership by an ISPs' council sounds attractive to me. Another for-profit Openreach II sounds like a recipe for Utter Cockup II. But my preferred option is to do nothing rather than tying up the industry in more bureaucratic mess. Fix any individual problems individually.

[Chrysalis]

In all fairness I dont blame them.   The report which those MPs put their names to was full of holes and inaccuracies. 

As regards to roll out will be slower if there was a split.   I thought that had been established as a fact rather than a threat.   
Even those who are pro-split acknowledge that the red tape that would be caused by a split (and Im not talking deliberate stalling) would cause a delay.
It is purely because of the resulting mess that what ensue after a split that I am in the 'dont split' camp.   I do not see how a split would bring benefit to the UK consumers.  There are other ways that short comings could be resolved.   If you watch the parliamentary debates on the subject, even the most anti-BT have admitted that it would tie BT up in paperwork for years.

its easy to point holes in the opposition argument, but you havent proposed what you think needs to be done.

Or do you truly believe keeping the status quo with no changes at all is the way forward?

What I dont condone is threats been made, BT saying investment will be dropped etc. is basically a threat.  If I was in government and that was made to me I would remind them I could pull all BDUK funding if I wanted to be awkrawd and increase their taxes to put them in their place I could also choose to rollout FTTP nationwide and devalue their copper network over night openreach would become almost irrelevant then.  One way to put BT in its place.

[Chrysalis]

Ownership by an ISPs' council sounds attractive to me. Another for-profit Openreach II sounds like a recipe for Utter Cockup II. But my preferred option is to do nothing rather than tying up the industry in more bureaucratic mess. Fix any individual problems individually.

This is what I think is the way to go as well.  I wouldnt be against openreach staying part of BT if it improves, the problem is, I cannot see it improving without a split.

[Chrysalis]

The way I would approach is this.

If ofcom decide to split BT/openreach. I would give BT a choice.

They can choose to not fight it and we move forward.
Or if they pull investment, take it to court, I proceed with a nationwide FTTP rollout with the aim of destroying BT's market. One has to play dirty with a dirty opponent.

--edit--

In case I come across as super aggressive.  I just dont like a company trying to brute force the result it wants.

What I havent heard from BT is how they propose to improve the situation if they can keep hold of openreach instead I have just heard promises they will sabotage ofcom's plans and make it worse, so they come across as sour grapes and saying what we got now we should be grateful for and if you dont like it we will make it worse, the only reason I have heard for preventing the split is they dont want it to happen because their shareholders wont be happy, which shouldnt be a relevant factor in ofcom's decision.  To me a proposal of rolling out g.fast to properties close to a cabinet isnt much ambition and it does nothing in regards to their really bad service levels (close to the worst in the world).

If sky and co e.g. really did block openreach having direct contact with end users in terms of fault reporting and billing, then BT should come out and say it and say they propose to introduce that direct contact, then they may get my backing in a more serious way, but they havent said any such thing.

[Bowdon]

I wonder if keeping OR with BT and also allowing other ISP's access to the technology, a bit like it used to be with ADSL would be a way forward.

So an ISP can either go through OR or send their own engineer.

Also when laying new fibre pipes and ducts is it only OR allowed to do this process? (I'm meaning as in extending OR's network)

What if other ISP's wanted to get planning permission to dig up places and put in fibres too? I think it would be good to have the option there.

As long as the different projects arent crossing over each other and they are all installing the same materials for compatibility then I don't see a big problem. Though as suggested earlier, it would be better if this came under the control of an ISP's council etc.

I don't see a big issue in allowing direct access to ISP's. It seems to me that they all signed up for OR to operate and do all the work, and now they (and some customers) are frustrated that OR isn't doing what they want to do. So I guess allowing them access and see how far they get is one solution. Pressure will be on ISP's directly. In the long run OR might come out on top depending on how ISP's conduct themselves.

Also lets not forget a lot of ISP's seem to fob their customers off and pass the buck to OR, though the ISP's customer service doesn't pass on all complaints. This is why some ISP's are better than others because they are more hands on. So I do think something as to change. But it needs to be for the better, and to also remove this passing the buck mentality.

These ISP's need to get digging up some trenches. If ISP's like Sky want to be king of the Internet then they need to put some money and wo/man power in to it.

[Weaver]

Why are the pro-separation people saying that BT is rubbish? (I'm assuming that they are saying such.)

[Black Sheep]

Because they have no facts to back up their allegations .......... for example "BT's service levels being close to the worst in the World". Complete and utter made-up drivel.

Again, I would refer the readership to the in-depth blog written by Ignitionet, that is riddled with factual debate and probable outcomes, pro and anti-split. Coupled with W3 and Kitz's own factual input, it addresses the reality of the situation but in a constructive manner ......... not by throwing out ignorant quotes like the one mentioned at the start of this post. 

[c6em]

A rare glimpse into the number of faults BT get came in a Plusnet service status report email issued on the 10/02/2016.
On Monday 8th Feb (storm Imogen) BT got 18001 faults reported (yes that is eighteen thousand)

[guest]

I wonder if keeping OR with BT and also allowing other ISP's access to the technology, a bit like it used to be with ADSL would be a way forward.

A bit like it used to be before ADSL seems more appropriate to me.

If anyone remembers "Surftime" (or whatever it was called) back in the late 90s/early 00s then that provides an indication of a possible way forward.

Back then you paid (BT) for unmetered 56kbps access to a certain range of number prefixes (084something ? - can't remember) and you paid a seperate ISP to provide internet connectivity. The ISP had nothing to do with the landline. LLU blew that model apart but unless we're going to have sub-loop VDSL unbundling (lunacy on wheels) then something is going to have to change.

Personally I see nothing wrong with a model where you pay (an "independent") Openreach directly for a data/voice connection (ADSL/VDSL/FTTP) to the exchange and then pay an ISP to provide suitable internet connectivity.

Obviously you'd need some regulation so that Openreach couldn't be taken over by one ISP/cartel of ISPs or compete with those ISPs but that'd be a lot more straightforward than the current regulatory nonsense.

Pick your own voice service, should you require one - ISPs shouldn't be able to REQUIRE you to take their voice service either.

Openreach would make more money (lots more) than it currently does; customers would have a direct contact for faults & retail ISPs (both Sky & BT spring to mind here) wouldn't be able to cross-subsidise stuff like EPL football by bumping up line rental every year.

I doubt anything will actually happen to BT/Openreach. The govt needs them both "on-side" as the bulk in-depth spying envisaged by the Investigatory Powers Bill will be much harder to implement if BT is being "arsey" about an Openreach split.