French Senate adopts bill to reduce rural digital divide

The French Senate has adopted a bill tabled by UMP senator Xavier Pintat aiming to reduce the digital divide, especially in rural areas, writes AFP. The text calls for the creation of a fund to develop fibre optic networks in the most isolated rural zones as well as to strengthen the national system supporting the analogue TV switch-off. Pintat stated that like electricity, very high speed internet access will soon become a vital service, and lamented the fact that there were only 180,000 fibre customers in France, compared to 18 million high-speed subscribers, and that the fibre users were all in urban areas.

Digital economy minister Nathalie Koscusko-Morizet backed the bill. The opposition Socialist Party abstained and Socialist Senator Michel Teston said the legislation would do nothing to improve the digital divide and that local and regional governments, rather than the central government, will have to pay for any new measures. The bill is expected to go before the National Assembly in the autumn.