Whistleblower sacked over BT rural broadband leak
Fascinating story this – lest I provoke the ire of BT for offering any anlaysis here it is to speak for itself!!
A whistleblower at the Department for Culture Media and Sport has been sacked for sharing confidential information that suggests BT is inflating its charges for building Britain’s rural broadband network.
The chair of the Public Accounts Committee, Margaret Hodge, has asked for an investigation. The row is yet another sign of growing disquiet around the rural broadband project being run by the DCMS.
Ministers have been accused of effectively giving BT a £1bn public subsidy without genuine competition. Mike Kiely, a consultant to the department’s broadband development UK project since it was launched in 2010, was dismissed after information he sent to councils to help them get better value for money was leaked to the Brokentelephone blog.
The department has refused to comment. BT has denied inflating charges and says it has secured contracts because it is committing extra funds to improve broadband access.
Described by one of those who knows him well as “a serious person who wanted to do the right thing”, Kiely is understood to have been sacked two weeks ago because the information he shared was commercially confidential to BT. A DCMS spokesman said: “We do not comment on individual staffing matters.”
Following the leak, a DCMS email trawl uncovered that Kiely had sent a document to councils with price information, in which he argued that BT’s charges for installing fibre connected cabinets in rural areas were inflated and did not reflect actual costs.