Business reacts to Labour pledge
Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of the world economy, the financial markets, the eurozone and business.
Overnight, UK businesses have been digesting Labour’s latest election pledge that would result in the part-nationalisation of telecoms giant BT.
It is part of a plan to bring free full-fibre broadband to every home and business across the UK – but there’s clearly a question on costs.
The Labour party said the estimated capital cost of rolling out full-fibre broadband was £15bn, on top of the government’s existing £5bn earmarked for broadband expansion. This would be funded from its green transformation fund – paid for by borrowing.
But BT boss Philip Jansen has now weighed in and said the scheme would cost at least £100bn.
Speaking to the BBC, Jansen said:
These are very, very ambitious ideas and the Conservative Party have their own ambitious idea for full fibre for everyone by 2025 and how we do it is not straight forward.
We’ll continue to bring you the latest business reaction as we get it.
Also coming up…
The agenda
- 9.30am GMT: Eurozone inflation, final estimate for October
- 1.30pm GMT: US retail sales for October
- 2.15pm GMT: US industrial production