Telecom executives were called for a meeting with the government and the regulator, Ofcom, recently for sketching out a plan to prevent Britain from lagging in the global broadband league and help the market operate effectively.

Telecom executives were called for a meeting with the government and the regulator, Ofcom, recently for sketching out a plan to prevent Britain from lagging in the global broadband league and help the market operate effectively.

The summit to be organised by the competitiveness minister and former e-commerce minister, Stephen Timms, would be dealing with different ways to increase the Internet access speeds, determining who would be paying for the £7 billion or so for the infrastructure and will also be paving the way for services like high-definition internet TV.

The formulation of a next-generation access network may imply Britain dumping the traditional copper phone lines and opting instead for the fibre-optic cabling.

BT's chief executive, Ben Verwaayen, and the firm's retail and Openreach network divisions, Virgin Media, Sky and Carphone Warehouse, Cable & Wireless are expected to be represented at the summit.

Ofcom is already consulting on the next generation access networks, with industry providers until December 5 for disclosing its views. According to Ofcom's chief executive, Ed Richards, the present access network would be running out of steam in the future. He also adds that the consumers would be demanding faster and faster network access and it would all be a matter of time before this happens.

Internet TV services like ITV, BBC's iPlayer, and 4oD from Channel 4 have expressed their fears about the UK network becoming congested. The meeting at this point comes as a new research proving that types of services accessed online are to put more pressure on network capacity and broadband speeds.