Broadband Update, June 2018

The parish council has been working with BT for some time now to come up with a scheme to deliver better broadband to the parishes. Last year we identified by way of a survey that about 90 properties in the Grafton Flyford and North Piddle area had very slow broadband that did not comply with the government target of 2M. BT responded to this survey with their own assessment which included only 62 properties.

BT is under no legal obligation to upgrade broadband above 2M where it does not consider it to be economically viable, however they gave us a quotation under their community scheme to provide fibre to the premises to these properties. When the available subsides were taken into account this worked out at about £260 per household. The parish council promoted this scheme but were very quickly asked to challenge BT about the 30 odd properties that had been left out. These included properties along the A422 almost to the border with Dormston.

After some negotiation, BT agreed to include these properties in the scheme and requoted for the work. Two weeks ago the government revised its subsidy scheme and it now looks like an enhanced community scheme covering 89 properties in Libbery, Grafton Flyford, North Piddle and the lower end of Flyford Flavell along the A422 can be delivered entirely within the subsidy.

The parish council has managed to identify enough businesses and residents willing to participate in the voucher scheme to cover the cost of the work and the quotation from BT has been accepted and the application for the funds has been made.

The scheme now has to be agreed by The Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). Assuming that the scheme is agreed, Openreach will then ratify the premises to be connected and work should begin with a view to faster broadband being available this time next year.

We are aware that there are still outlying properties that are not in this scheme or do not have faster broadband within Flyford Flavell and the parish council will continue to campaign for faster broadband to all the premises in the parishes. If you are not sure if you are in the scheme or would like to be included in our next campaign please contact either Steve Nesbitt or Mark Broughton-Taylor.