UFC-Que Choisir campaigns for an “enforceable right to quality internet”


To avoid an aggravation of the digital divide between households in areas covered by fiber and others, the government recently announced the strengthening of its “Digital cohesion of territories” window.

This must allow residents who do not have access to fiber to access very high speed via non-wired technology, such as satellite internet, fixed 4G or 5G or THD Radio. To do this, the latter will see the subsidy allowing them to cover part of the cost of access to these solutions increase from 150 euros to 300 euros on the 1er next April (support which could go up to 600 euros subject to means testing).

If the strengthening of the counter is welcome for the inhabitants affected by the digital divide, the president of the association UFC-Que Choisir Alain Bazot regretted this Monday the lack of transparency of this aid. “There is no guarantee that all victims of the digital divide can benefit from this aid,” he argues in a blog post.

Towards an enforceable right to a quality internet?

“Making the assumption – far from being excessive – that the areas in which the fixed Internet is of poor quality are also those where the mobile Internet has the lowest speeds, one cannot fail to wonder how the Fixed 4G could really be a solution for consumers,” he asks.

And to campaign for “an enforceable right to quality internet” rather than a “financial gesture for a temporary solution”, even though complaints relating to fiber have multiplied in 2021, as recently noted by the Mediator of electronic communications in its annual report. “Instead of setting non-binding network deployment targets, the public authorities should commit to consumers, in the law, to provide them with effective access to very high quality broadband”, underlines the President of the consumer protection association.

If this enforceable right were adopted, consumers could “in the event of a dispute over the debits actually observed in the field […] ask for financial compensation high enough to encourage the public authorities to invest in the networks”.

An already real digital divide

The door is far from being closed on the side of the authorities: let us recall that the hypothesis of a universal broadband service, which will include a right of access to the Internet for all at an affordable cost, is currently under discussion. study and that a recent parliamentary mission proposed at the beginning of 2021 to dissociate the universal service from fixed telephony and the Internet.

However, guaranteeing access to fiber for all is not on the agenda for the public authorities, who have postponed the study of this question to 2025, the date on which the whole (or almost) of the territory should be equipped with FttH. “In practice, however, nothing ensures that the provisional will not extend beyond this date”, notes Alain Bazot, however, who points to the current flaws in the final connection of subscribers already theoretically connected to the fiber.

According to UFC-Que Choisir, the urgency is therefore indeed there. Especially since, according to the speedtest of the QuelDébit association, “a gap separates the cities and the countryside in terms of performance” of mobile networks. However, fixed networks alone will not be enough to make up for the “holes in the racket”, even though the switchover period from copper to fiber which is announced over the next few years is causing some elected officials in rural areas to fear a worsening of the digital divide in certain regions already lacking in connectivity.





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