That has more to do with the economics of running cable to the middle of nowhere than it does competition. (BT are not the only people who can build broadband i

That has more to do with the economics of running cable to the middle of nowhere than it does competition. (BT are not the only people who can build broadband infrastructure and the fact that no cable operator has bothered to run a line out there either should be a good indication that it's not viable.) If you want easy access to the countryside and all of the nice things it offers then you can't be surprised to find out that there are some drawbacks to making that choice. It's unreasonable to expect people who live in high density environments to subsidize your Internet access. But that has nothing to do with competition - once BT does enable the exchange all the competing broadband services will be available. You won't be at the mercy of them being able to charge any price they like just because they built the infrastructure, and in a remote location that's even more important than it is in London where building a second competing telecoms network might be profitable.