The Digital Divide Discriminates Against 36% Of The UK's Population

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The Geographical Divide:

There is also a geographical divide, which Ping Wales believes is widening. The conclusion reached in ‘UK digital divide is widening’, by Marjorie Delwarde, cites the findings of research company Point Topic. It reveals that the Home Counties and London perform the best with 25 cable and DSL lines per 100 people in Wandsworth, for example, this number drops slightly in South Buckingham to 20 per 100. The statistics for broadband access in the rural areas of Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and West Somerset tumble down to the lowest rate of 4.9 per 100 in the Western Isles.

Going further beyond the social, economic, and geographic causes of the digital divide is apathy, a lack of interest in the Internet. However, there are an increasing number of ways to access the web, including mobile, so John Wilson’s description of Wales as a big white desert in broadband terms, is he admits not quite accurate. Wilson is a member of the Wales Broadband Stakeholder Group. Even though BT has enabled most of its exchanges for ADSL broadband access, it also appears that you can be 6 miles away from one in a rural area and still not be able to get online.