Digital Britain

The Secretary of State rightly said that if it were left to the market, a third of the country would not receive super-fast broadband; I rather suspect that my part of the world would be part of that third. Is he aware that many remote rural economies have been built on new age connectivity, with call centres, ISDN links and so forth? Can he therefore give an assurance that the last third will not be left until last, since those fragile economies depend on competitive connectivity for their economic future?