Britain Plans to Get All Residents Online

Carrie-Ann Skinner, PC Advisor

Saturday, May 03, 2008 6:25 AM PDT

The U.K. government is drawing up plans to get every resident online.

Under the Digital Inclusion Strategy strategy, produced by minister for digital inclusion Paul Murphy, the 17 million Britons currently without PC access at home or at work will be able to get online.

A study last week revealed China has become the top Internet user, but still only has 16 percent penetration by its residents.

While no official time table for the plan has been announced, Murphy hopes the strategy will be rolled out this summer and will be completed by 2010, in line with existing E.U. plans to bridge the gap between those on- and offline.

Speaking at the National Digital Inclusion Conference this week, Murphy said: "Chances are these people come from an older or socially, economically or geographically disadvantaged group."

Murphy admitted that he was "not a technical person", but said that this wasn't an issue.

"The more I thought about it, the more I realized that I didn't need to be technical at all. It also became pretty obvious the enormity of the work," he added.

The minister also revealed he had drawn up a mission statement in preparation for the plans.

"We came up with the following mission statement: to coordinate policies and a coherent strategy that all citizens, especially the disadvantaged, can benefit from new technologies," he said.

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