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Number of Brits with broadband connections rises - making home working more of a possibility
The amount of Britons who have broadband in their homes has risen in the last year, a fact which makes flexible employment and working from home an option for many people.
According to data from the Office for National Statistics, the number of Brits' with broadband access at home has more than doubled in the last year - it has gone from by 56 per cent in 2008 to 63 per cent in 2009.
This means that almost two-thirds of the population now have internet access at home - a total of 16.5 million people.
More British adults are accessing the internet each day, as the data revealed that the number who had never used it had dropped by 21 per cent in the last year.
The International Communications Market data research from Ofcom has shown that internet and broadband access is not the only technology that Brits are embracing, they are also using more digital communications and phones.
According to the report, the UK has the highest proportion of digital TV homes in the world and the price of these digital communications are lower than they were a year ago.
But the part of the research that may be of interest to businesses considering flexible employment and home working is the growth in the number of phone calls being made from private addresses.
UK residents not only have the lowest mobile and broadband prices in the world - great for keeping in touch with the office - but also make the third highest number of calls from a landline in the world.
This averages at 190 minutes of calls each month from home phone lines.
Richard Patterson, marketing director for Expert-Broadband.co.uk, remarked that the findings showed how much Brits loved to adopt new technologies.
He added that the rise in the popularity of social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook was one of the reasons for the take-up of broadband.
Mr Patterson remarked that the government should add tax incentives for companies to invest in the broadband infrastructure and create faster speeds.
He commented that the proposed yearly £170 million broadband tax was very ambitious and added: "Deregulation of the market would encourage more commercial investment as it has done in France and may be a better option."
Alistair Darling, chancellor of the exchequer, said the funding to create super-fast broadband would be generated via a 50p duty tax on UK landlines.
The International Communications Market report comparison charts on internet speed from earlier this week showed that the UK's broadband speed is slower than many other European countries.
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