BT will come under renewed pressure from the Government later to commit to an upgrade of the broadband network to fibre that could cost up to £15bn.

Stephen Timms, the competitiveness minister, has invited BT along with other operators including Virgin Media, Cable & Wireless, Carphone Warehouse and Sky summit to discuss the future of broadband in the UK. Mr Timms doesn't want the UK to fall behind such countries as Japan, Korea and France who have invested heavily in providing high speed fibre networks which put Britain's aging copper network to shame.

BT are planning high-level delegation to the event with chief executive Ben Verwaayen being joined by  Ian Livingstone, who runs the customer-facing division, and Steve Robertson, the head of the wholesale arm. They will argue that thay are currently spending £10bn to update Britain's network and adding fibre into the equation would add an extra £15bn to provide fibre to the door or £7bn to provide fibre to the cabinet.

They want industry regulator, Ofcom,to set the price which people will pay for these high speed services so it will be able to get a minimum value return on the substantial investment. Although this may not be popular with other telcos such are Virgin who already own a substantial fibre network, and also new players such as Tiscali and the Carphone Warehouse who maybe allowed to lay their own fibre to BT's exchanges.