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The reaction to the budget announcement by Alistair Darling about governments’ planned financial aid for implementation of the Digital Britain Universal Service has not been positive.

Charles Trotman, an expert of broadband industry and the chief of rural business development of the Country Land and Business Association (CLA), said that there is serious flaw in the entire proposal, as the money promised can apparently not be released until 2012, which is the year of conclusion of the project.

Severely criticising the budget report, Trotman said that there was a lot of ambiguity about the budget. Even by the end of the report, he was not sure how much money would come to the project, which is to be funded from money that would be remaining after the Digital TV switch project. He said that ultimately the amount available could be less than the budget estimate of £250 million.

The government’s plan of providing all homes in the UK with a broadband connection with speeds of at least 2MB is already turning out to be a contentious project on many accounts. Many even argue that the speed of 2MB for broadband UK is not fast enough.

While expressing his views regarding the announcement, Oliver Johnson, chief executive of broadband analysis company Point Topic, said that the budget report was not extensive enough in detail. He said that it is better to wait for Lord Carter’s final report before commenting on the inadequacy of resources. He also said that the figures quoted in the budget report looked small compared to what US (around 10 billion US Dollars) and Australia (around 20 billion Australian Dollars) are planning to spend.

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