BT urges people to drop mobile phones

British Telecom, the UK's second largest mobile phone operator, has launched an advertising campaign urging people not to use mobile phones.

The posters ask people to use public call boxes, which have suffered a huge drop in use due to the increase in mobile phones.

Call boxes have lost 37% of revenue in the last two years.

BT Cellnet has 10.2 million mobile subscribers, but Payphones, another subsidiary of BT, is saying in the ads: "Mobile phones may be getting lighter, but they can still be heavy on the pocket".

BT admits the campaign might represent a conflict of interests but says it is merely healthy competition between two different parts of the company.

"We have restructured, so they can compete," a spokesman said.