Andrew Sparrow's election briefing: Labour's broadband pledge dominates

Jeremy Corbyn promises free, full-fibre broadband for everyone in the country

Labour would deliver it by 2030 by nationalising part of BT, with remote and rural areas of Britain currently getting the worst broadband receiving the new service first. The ongoing cost would be paid for by a new tax on tech giants, with the free broadband saving families on average £30 a month, Labour says. In a speech in Lancaster Corbyn said that only 10% of Britain has access to full-fibre broadband, while in South Korea coverage is 98%. He said this showed how Labour would be using the power of the state to deliver an essential public service. He said:

My colleagues Mark Sweney and Patrick Collinson have a good analysis here of how feasible the plan is.

• Labour’s plans has caused alarm in the City, where it was claimed that the party has massively underestimated the cost of its free full-fibre broadband offer and that the prospect of further nationalisation could halt further investment in the sector. The plan to nationalise Openreach, the broadband division of BT, caused particular shock because until last night Labour had claimed that it had no nationalisation plans beyond its existing commitments to bring rail, energy, water and the Royal Mail back in to public ownership. The BT chief executive Philip Jansen said Labour’s plans would not cost £20bn, as the party claimed, but closer to £100bn. Julian David, chief executive of tech trade association techUK, said Labour’s plans would be a “disaster” for the sector. He said:

• Boris Johnson dismissed the plan as a “crazed communist scheme”. And the Conservatives sought to play up fears that the Corbyn plan shows that Labour’s nationalisation agenda will turn out to be more extensive than the party admits.

• But the Tories were also keen to stress their own plans to roll out improved broadband services, and there is likely to be some nervousness in CCHQ about how voters will react to the Labour giveaway. As a retail offer, it is big enough to get noticed – even by a public that seems bored and disengaged from the election. Corbyn’s analysis of the problem faced by the public is sound (Ed Miliband had a very pithy summary here), and ‘people like free stuff’ is not a bad guide to electoral behaviour. But this is a plan that marks an extension of the nationalisation agenda (other services being nationalised by Labour were once in the public sector; broadband wasn’t, because it did not exist in that era), and although voters might easily agree with Corbyn that the broadband service they are getting now is unsatisfactory, whether they think it would be any better under a monopoly state provider is another matter. The Tories claim a similar project in Australia has been a disaster. At this stage it is just too early to know how the electoral politics of this announcement will unfold.

Meanwhile

• Johnson has faced questions about how “relatable” he is during a BBC Breakfast interview. In his encounter with the BBC’s Naga Munchetty, and a subsequent hour-long phone-in on Radio 5 Live, there were also references to the fact that no one even knows for sure how many children he has. Johnson did not seem to enjoy the references to his private life, but he insisted – as he always – that he would not talk about his family, and got through both programmes without significant embarrassment.

• Johnson has escalated his attacks on Corbyn and Labour, claiming that that Corbyn’s plans are “absolutely terrifying”. In a short speech unveiling his battlebus, he sought to justify this charge with a serious of allegations about the opposition – many of which were partially or wholly untrue.

• Sir Ed Davey, the Lib Dem Treasury spokesman, has said his party would use regulation to make Britain “the gold standard of climate capitalism for the world”. He also said that the Lib Dems were committed to a £100bn programme over five years to tackle climate change.

• Police are launching their biggest ever operation to keep election candidates safe from attacks and abuse amid rising concern from politicians about the dangers they face.

Sign up here to receive Andrew Sparrow’s election briefing direct to your email inbox every weekday.

If you’re using the Guardian app and would like a daily alert to Andrew Sparrow’s election briefing, click here and select “get notifications”.