In an interview on Ofcomwatch, Ofcom's CEO Ed Richards, has denied that a serious competitor to BT's next generation network would need any kind of public funding.

The 21st Century Network (21CN) is currently being rolled out across the UK by BT, but Ofcom hopes that this will make it easier for other suppliers to roll out other services to customers, but some industry insiders fear that BT could end up with little or no competition. Cable & Wireless, Easynet and Thus are planning similar networks, but these will be on a far smaller scale that those of BT.

So it seems Ofcom are taking a backseat and seeing how things pan out first before thinking on any action, no change there then.