Rural broadband: not a single shovel has yet broken sod

Despite Coalition pledges to give the UK Europe's best broadband network by 2015, plans to bring fast connectivity to the countryside are falling behind, a rural pressure group is warning.

The Countryside Alliance has today complained, using data obtained under the FoI Act, that plans to bring fast broadband to rural areas have stalled. The pressure group has also warned that unless the whole process is simplified, the digital divide will keep growing and the money pledged will be all but worthless.

Last October Chancellor George Osborne named four pilot areas - Cumbria, Herefordshire, North Yorkshire and the Highlands and Islands - as pilot areas for rural superfast broadband networks. A government spokesman said all four pilot projects were making good progress, and ministers remained confident that Britain would have Europe's best broadband network by 2015.

But after the Freedom of information requests were sent to councils in each area, it's come out that local councils have not yet started work on their broadband projects. Indeed, their responses revealed that none had received any money from the Treasury, chosen a company to build their networks, or started work on them.

"It has been over a year since these pilots were set up and the people who live in areas with no or unreliable broadband coverage haven't seen any improvement," Alice Barnard, chief executive of the Countryside Alliance told the BBC's Today programme last week.

"Unless more is done to simplify the process of acquiring and implementing rural broadband projects, the digital divide will continue to grow and the money pledged by the Coalition will remain all but worthless."

In response, a spokesman for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport countered, "The money for these projects has been allocated and will be provided to the local authorities when they begin spending on the projects. This is standard practice in provision of capital grants."

The lack of progress in extending the rural broadband network has been revealed just weeks after the Chancellor announced a £100m boost to broadband coverage in London, Belfast, Edinburgh and Cardiff, with a further six cities to be identified later, delivering superfast broadband to 90% of homes, as part of his tought Autumn Statement.

It is widely acknowledged that fast broadband services are crucial to consumers and businesses to allow them to take full advantage of web content. While rollouts in urban areas develop apace, efforts to get equivalent services in more remote areas have been far more sluggish.

Supplier executives at a Westminster eForum policy conference last month said government plans to have everyone on superfast broadband within ten years were unrealistic, expressing concern that the funds available to plug so-called 'not spots' were not enough to ensure that remote places such as the Scottish Islands had access to broadband speeds of 25 megabits per second (Mbps) or more by 2015.

Suppliers like BT, Fujitsu and Cable & Wireless have put in bids to build networks in various areas and each council must decide which to choose. Many of those bidding to build networks want to use BT's infrastructure rather than build from scratch. BT has agreed to share access to its telegraph poles and underground ducts and recently cut the cost of renting such equipment.