General election: Boris Johnson dismisses Labour’s broadband plan as ‘crackpot

The Labour Party says it will save families an average of £30 a month on bills by rolling out free full fibre broadband.

Mr Johnson has been taking questions from the public on Radio Five Live. He was asked about what leaving the EU will do for chippies by an owner.

He said: “I love fish and chips and certainly want to do everything I can to support your industry.

“Once we get Brexit done we will have access to our entire marine wealth, the entire fisheries of the UK will be under our control again.

“The basic point Craig is that your raw materials, your haddock, your cod, your plaice, your scampi, your whatever, cod roe, all the stuff that you sell,  the fish will be more readily available.”

Mr Johnson defended the way he makes his tea while answering questions in an interview today.

A video of him chatting about the campaign trail was put out by the party earlier this week, but the thing that most caught people’s eye was him leaving his tea bag in the mug while he poured in the milk.

In fact, he didn’t take it out at all.

Asked about it, he said: “Why does everyone object to it?

“It’s delicious! It’s better.”

He was also shown footage of him attempting to mop up a shop while in a flood hit area and asked “have you ever mopped”.

He was defiant, saying: “I thought that was unfair, you don’t like my mop work… I was squeezing it!”

Mr Johnson was asked about middle management NHS staff on “high salaries” and procurement in terms of financing the NHS.

He said they were putting “a huge amount” into the NHS, possible because of a “strong economy”.

He said Simon Stevens had a programme of reform, and said: “This kind of stuff needs a government which is focused on improving and reforming all public services.

“We could do it better, we could save money.

“That’s the choice we face. Get Brexit done, move forward and tackle things like public procurement and needless expense that crops up.”

Asked about the A&E waiting figures which came out yesterday, he was asked if he felt a “sense of shame” at the effect of a Conservative government.

The caller, who said she has MS, said: “The way I have been treated has been fantastic, I’m on medication and that’s why the NHS is a must where we have to cut out money. That is what most people want, they want more nurses and more doctors.”

The PM said he did take responsibility for the poor A&E figures which came out yesterday and went onto tout figures of more nurses which are in the NHS since he took over.

Boris Johnson has called a Labour plan to offer free broadband to all homes “some crackpot scheme”.

John McDonnell will today announce that under a Labour government, Openreach will be renationalised and every home and business will get free broadband.

Mr Johnson said: “What we are going to deliver is gigabyte broadband for all and what we won’t be doing is some crackpot scheme that would involve many, many tens of billions of taxpayers’ money nationalising a British business.”

A nursery owner has called in to talk about rising costs and the charges she is having to pass onto parents.

She says hers is in danger of closing, and “we are really struggling”.

The PM thanks her for what she is doing and says good, affordable childcare is “the holy grail”.

The government pays £4.90 an hour per child equivalent for childcare at the moment.

The nursery owner questions whether there are problems because the industry is mostly women – in terms of staffing and those affected.

The PM said: “We have more women in the workforce than ever before and the gender pay gap is closing.

“I accept that childcare is the crucial thing. We will say a lot more in the manifesto.

“The ages at which we think it should be funded as well. We will be doing what we can to cut business rates to help too.”

Boris Johnson says he is proud to say he went to the same primary school as the Miliband brothers.

But he then has it pointed out: “You also went to Eton.”

He refuses to talk about his children but later confirms: “Your assertion that none of my children went to state schools is wrong.”

A former headteacher poses this tricky question after admitting she was beaten by the system and quit her job.

The PM says he wants to rid form filling and hopes to be able to give teachers more time to do what they love.

Ed Vaizey, who was the broadband minister between 2014 and 2016 has said the policy announced by Labour to roll out free broadband to every home and business is “crazy”.

He said: “I think they’re sort of crazy really, I think they’re completely unnecessary and I think they’ll achieve precisely the opposite of what Labour intends.

“It will end up costing taxpayers a huge amount of money and I suspect it will delay the rollout of super fast broadband hugely.

“I think they will achieve completely the opposite effect.

“I think there’s a difference between government investing strategically where there is market failure, and I’ll acknowledge that in some areas there is market failure, and a wholesale nationalisation of the telecoms network.

“Australia have tried the sort of nationalisation approach with their broadband network, it’s been a ten-year project, it’s gone three times over-budget from 15 billion dollars to 45/51 billion dollars, and it’s meant that Australia has dropped down the broadband rankings.”

Sir Ed has been speaking to BBC Radio 4 ahead of his speech on the Lib Dems’ climate change plans later.

He said the party would invest 3100bn over five years in “clean transport, clean energy, on insulating people’s homes and protecting the environment”.

He added: “We’re doing this today because we believe that stopping climate change is probably even more important than stopping Brexit, it’s fundamental to what Liberal Democrats are talking about.

“With these policies we want to make Britain the world’s first climate-friendly economy.”

The EU commission has approved €2.6bn of public support for the Irish National Broadband Plan.

The scheme will bring high speed broadband to consumers and businesses in areas with poor connectivity. The new network will be capable of supporting download speeds of at least 150 Megabits per second (Mbps) and upload speeds of at least 30 Megabits per second (Mbps).

The subsidised network will offer wholesale access to all operators on an open, transparent and non-discriminatory basis, and will therefore incentivise private investments in the provision of high-speed internet services to households and businesses in the target areas.

Mr Corbyn says he promised a radical plan when he started the campaign, and jokes about not even having launched the manifesto yet.

He trails the new policy – broadband, the fastest – for all and for free.

And once it is up, he says they will tax the big corporations like Google and Facebook, fairly, to pay for it.

He says it’s a policy for the many.

He says: “As a country we should be proud of our history of building treasured public institutions and services.

“In the 19th Century it was the public waterworks.

“In the 20th Century it was our fantastic National Health Service, freeing people from the fear of illness.

“British Broadband will be our treasured public institution for the 21st century, delivering fast and free broadband to every home.

“Only the government has the planning ability, economies of scale and ambition to take this on.

“This is a mission for everyone to get behind.”