The broadband lessons we need to learn from Andorra, Latvia and Madagascar

The UK is lagging behind much smaller nations when it comes to broadband speeds. We need more investment and honesty from broadband providers.

Modern life in the UK, for many of us, is reliant on a decent broadband service.

So much of our working life revolves around using the cloud, while as a nation we love a good streaming service, with 7.5 million households subscribing to Netflix and 3.84 million households boasting an Amazon Prime Video subscription.

We even have government ministers launching their own apps (though the less said about that, the better).

The trouble is that, compared the other countries, UK broadband speeds are pretty underwhelming.

Lagging behind Madagascar

American research partnership M-Lab conducted 163m broadband speed tests worldwide, with the data brought together by comparison site Cable.co.uk.

It found that the UK is currently sat just 35th in the world, with an average speed of 18.57Mbps.

That's less than a third of the fastest nation, Singapore (60Mbps), and even lags well behind the island of Jersey (30.9Mbps).

Now sure, things could be a lot worse - we enjoy faster speeds than those of 165 other nations.

But equally, there are plenty of nations above us on the list who you would not expect to be more advanced than us when it comes to internet connectivity – the likes of Bulgaria, Estonia, Andorra, Latvia, Romania and Madagascar (pictured below).

There are a total of 25 European nations ahead of the UK.

So what’s going on?

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Being half-hearted with full fibre

The problem comes down to our slowness in embracing full fibre broadband.

Up to now, the approach has generally been to run the high-speed fibre cables to local street cabinets. Individual properties are then connected to those cabinets via slower, copper-based connections.

So while the speeds to those cabinets may be great, they inevitably drop off by the time they reach your home.

In contrast, full fibre broadband uses fibre to the premises (FTTP) tech, meaning that you get those full speeds directly.

These are not to be sniffed at either - they can boast broadband speeds of as much as 1Gbps.

Unfortunately, we have dawdled a bit in implementing this tech, with less than 5% of premises in the UK enjoying this sort of access.

It will get worse before it gets better

The good news is that the government is aware of this problem, with plans to roll out FTTP much more extensively across the nation.

Indeed, in its National Infrastructure Assessment 2018 report published this week, it set the target of making full fibre available to every home and business by 2033, with a ‘national broadband plan’ to be published by spring next year.

Philip Hammond, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, has previously said that the government wants to get full fibre in place for 15 million premises by 2025, which he admitted was ambitious.

Obviously, it is welcome that they are taking some action on boosting access to full fibre, particularly for rural areas which are still languishing with rubbish connections.

But the truth is that our lack of investment up to now will take time to overcome, and our international ranking will likely get worse as other nations who have been quicker in embracing the potential of full fibre continue to improve.

The UK's best and worse broadband providers (according to Ofcom)

Understand what you are paying for

As individuals, there isn’t much you can do about the UK’s reticence in delivering full fibre across the country. But it’s really important that you fully understand precisely what you are paying for when picking a broadband package, and what speeds you are actually likely to receive.

Since May, broadband providers have been forced to change the way they advertise their speeds. Previously they got away with plugging ‘up to’ speeds, but in reality, plenty of customers got nothing like the speeds they were expecting.

Thankfully now providers have to use average speeds, which should give you a more realistic idea of what to expect (read more about the rule change here). 

It’s also important to check whether that ‘fibre’ package you’re signing up actually means you are getting full fibre to your house or just to the local cabinet.

Greg Mesch, chief executive officer of infrastructure provider CityFibre, was spot on when he said: “The place to start is putting a stop to the misleading use of the word fibre in broadband advertising so that consumers know that when they see fibre, it is a fibre to the premises connection they are buying.

"Copper is dead: it is time for the UK to embrace full fibre – no ifs, no buts."

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