Monthly Archives - October 2005

In March 2005 the European Council agreed to re-launch the Lisbon agenda to focus it more sharply on the key priorities of jobs and growth. Subsequently, the Integrated Guidelines package, endorsed by the European Council in June 2005, identified the key challenges facing the EU as a whole. Member States were then invited to identify their own reform priorities and present forward-looking reform plans to the European Commission by 15th October 2005.

The UK’s first National Reform Programme was published on 13th October 2005. It sets out the challenges currently facing the UK economy, and details the Government’s forward looking agenda of economic reforms to ensure macroeconomic stability, to deliver higher productivity growth and to increase employment opportunity for all.

The UK National Reform Programme – October 2005

Global Europe: full-employment Europe – October 2005

The trial starts next month and will help prepare the so-called “Max” service, which offers speeds of up to 8Mbps (megabits per second).

BT’s broadband network currently offers download speeds of up to 2Mbps.

The telecoms giant is lagging behind some of its rivals which have already started offering much faster connection speeds of up 24Mbps.

BT said it was committed to ensuring that everyone could take advantage of the “broadband revolution” wherever they live in the UK.

BT gears up for ‘max’ broadband