Pledge of £20 million for rural broadband

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A new fund dedicated to rural broadband has been announced by the Government today, but questions have been raised as to whether it is enough for the UK’s and medium enterprises (SMEs) to thrive.

The environment secretary Caroline Spelman revealed up to £20 million would be put towards further broadband roll-out across rural areas, which a Government statement claimed would help “help end the digital and social divide” between remote locations and city centres.

The money will come from the Rural Development Programme for England and Broadband Delivery UK – the partnership challenged with achieving the Government goal of the “best superfast broadband network in Europe by 2015.”

Although the money has been welcomed, the Cloud Industry Forum (CIF) this week claimed more needed to be done to cover all rural areas as SMEs in those locations suffer, resulting in problems for the UK’s economic recovery.

Responding to a previous study by Ofcom showing the gap between advertised and achieved speeds of broadband infrastructure, Andy Burton, chair of the CIF, said: “It is small to medium sized businesses that represent our broadest employer base, our diversity and creativity, and it is they who are best placed to create the jobs and revenues the country needs.”

“However, their route to market in many cases is hampered by poor ADSL speeds which in turn restrict their ability to benefit from advances in technology like cloud computing, making it more costly, laborious and challenging to operate.”

“We cannot afford to give away our opportunity to thrive in a digital age by failing to provide the infrastructure that can harness our tremendous UK entrepreneurial capability,” he added.

“For small businesses based in rural or even semi-rural parts of the country broadband internet connectivity is vital to the economic prosperity of the entire nation.”

Culture secretary Jeremy Hunt admitted these communities had the “most to gain” from decent connectivity but were “currently missing out.”

“The whole of the UK should be able to share in the benefits of broadband and we are determined to make this happen by the end of the Parliament,” he said.

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