To the Op:
Whats your actual sync rate, attenuation and SNR margins (both upstream and downstream) from inside your router.
You may be suffering from contention which you may be able to complain against rather than traffic shaping. Traffic shaping normally only affects P2P and encrypted traffic - however if gaming latency is poor and websites are very slow to load (ie non secure sites) then raise a speed fault with your ISP.
If this doesn't get resolved in a timely fashion (ie they dont give you a reasonable timescale or dont reply at all) then follow the complaints procedure via recorded post. Most ISP's have 28 days to respond to a complaint and usually if its not resolved to your satisfaction you may be able to get out of your contract without penalty.
The whole 'upto 8Mb' argument ISP's uses to hide the fact that they traffic shape badly, makes my blood boil as its supposed to relate to line sync speed only.
Once you do leave get on O2 if you have an O2 PAYG/Contract phone in your household or BE Value (due to your line length - going only from the samknows results, will know more when you post proper figures).
