"make the provision of national coverage part of a licence obligation. "
"make the provision of licenced coverage part of a licence obligation. "
Why not indeed.
If the provision of coverage as per the granted licence within some reasonable time was actually required as part of the privilege of retaining the licence, the UK might actually have a nationwide set of proper fixed wireless access broadband networks by now.
Even if we didn't have such a set of networks, at least the licences wouldn't still all be in PCCW's hands, so if anyone else did want to have a go, they'd be able to apply for a licence.
Ofcon. What are they for, exactly?
If the same logic - deliver the service as per the licence obligation, or lose the licence - also applied to commercial radio, we wouldn't have identical Heart FM stations replacing the former "local" commercial stations from one end of the country to the other. But Ofcon don't seem to be able to cope with the concept of enforcing licence conditions else revoking the licence.
Ofcon certainly don't seem to be able to cope with the concept that there's little strategic value in having many competing broadband networks in some profitable places whilst a barely-regulated monopolist is left to service (or ignore) the less profitable ones. Same goes for mobile networks too, except there's no single monopolist.
Ofcon. What are they for, exactly?