“We already expect 95% of homes and businesses to have access to superfast broadband speeds of 24Mbps or faster by the end of 2017,” says BT CEO Gavin Patterson, “our latest initiative aims to ensure that all UK premises can get faster broadband, even in the hardest to reach parts of the UK.”

According to the government, BT’s new plan will provide coverage of at least 10Mbps to around 99% of homes and businesses by 2020 and 100% by 2022.

The government is to decide whether this offer is good enough, or if it wants to use its regulatory powers to force a broadband upgrade programme on BT.