Hideaway homes ‘too expensive’ to be reached in broadband rollout

NEARLY 150,000 rural homes are at risk of being “left behind” in the Government’s broadband rollout because it is too expensive to reach them with cables, MPS have said.

The public accounts committee said ministers appeared to have “no clear plan” for getting connections to the remotest communities where installing conventional broadband was not financially viable for private companies.

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, which is leading the rollout, has previously said it is looking at emerging technologies, such as satellites that can beam down internet coverage on remote areas.

MPS warned that ministers had not yet produced any details for how such a policy would work in practice.

In a report today, MPS say that with- out a plan and government funding, companies are likely to miss out remote areas because of the “prohibitively high cost” of connecting them. “Accelerating coverage through rollout by commercial operators rather than by prioritising those areas it knows are hardest to reach risks some of the areas that need improved connectivity most being once again left behind,” it said.

The Government is committed to expanding gigabit broadband, capable of reaching ultrafast speeds, across Britain. Boris Johnson initially pledged to spend £5billion so that 100 per cent of the country would have access by 2025, but that has been pushed back to 2030.

MPS said they were “not convinced” that ministers would even meet the reduced 85 per cent target by 2025 because of emerging delays in the contracts being negotiated with broadband providers.

Dame Meg Hillier, the chair of the committee, said that the ministry’s “planning and project management here show all the signs of the previous rollout – that the focus will continue to be on the easier to reach areas and there is still no clear plan for the hardest to reach communities”.

MPS said that rural areas such as the Cotswolds already had some of the lowest superfast broadband coverage and risked being left out under the plan. “If the 2025 target is going to be met it is essential that rural and remote areas, especially those who lack superfast broadband, receive significantly increased investment on the basis that the commercial sector will unlikely be able fill the gap,” the report said.

Dame Meg said: “What DCMS does know full well is it can’t rely on the private sector to get fast broadband to the hardest to reach, excluded and rural areas, and despite its repeated promises to do exactly that we are apparently little nearer to closing ‘the great digital divide’ developing across the UK nor addressing the social and economic inequality it brings with it.”