Snow hits Britain faster than the speed of – well, broadband!

Snow was predicted and snow did fall. Forecasts were fairly accurate and hundreds of people in South East England were forced to stay at home at the start of this week. According to MSN UK, British industry will lose millions of pounds as a result.

However, how much worse would it have been if large numbers of us couldn’t access our work email from home, continuing to communicate with customers and keep business moving?

Lord Carter’s call for broadband access to be universal by 2012 should surely come at the top of the government’s agenda to widen access to more households. Gordon Brown is quoted as having “welcomed the announcement”, saying “Our digital networks will be the backbone of our economy in the decades ahead.”

It’s clear we need to help commerce (including online) operate as effectively as possible, especially during the current cold economic climate.

According to The Times this Sunday, about 10m homes and 40% of people in Britain do not yet have broadband. In an increasingly small world as a result of the Internet, we must embrace the resources available to us to stand any chance of staying competitive on this global playing field.

Even on a basic level, how did most of us know the extent of this week’s weather problem? Well, the majority of us turned to the Internet for updates. Even local radio stations referred listeners to their websites for more details - followed closely by apologies for a lack of service as networks could not support the large number of hits.

The question remains who will pay for the faster, wider Internet services? Whoever it is will surely help Britain avoid paying the even greater price of being uncompetitive and out of touch with our global neighbours. Our recent weather predictions were right when they forecast a cold weather front – maybe we should trust our economic forecasts too and start preparing now for the future.