MPs urged to step in to speed up troubled broadband project

MPs are being urged to intervene to ensure delivery of superfast broadband in the South West.

Thirty-nine parish councils have written a joint letter to eight MPs asking them to press the Government and the county councils in Devon and Somerset to sort out problems with the publicly funded rollout in rural areas.

The provider, Gigaclear, has said it will not hit a delivery target until 2022 – two years later than scheduled.

Connecting Devon and Somerset – CDS, the body led by the two county authorities that is in charge of the project – has yet to approve Gigaclear’s revised schedule, and the parish councils are concerned that the already-delayed delivery could be pushed back even further.

In the joint letter, the Blackdown Hills Parish Council Network says CDS will not be able to find a supplier other than Gigaclear to do the job and should give the go-ahead. The parish council’s broadband spokesman, Graham Long, said: “It is clear that a solution needs to be put in place so that people in rural areas wait no longer than is absolutely necessary.”

Mr Long said Government funding for the project must be extended past the 2020 deadline.

The delays are said to be due to a series of factors including securing permission for cables to cross private land and congestion on pubic transport route.

Gigaclear has also admitted it did not have enough members of staff.

The company’s revised plan includes focusing on laying the main cables and bringing the 1,000Mpbs (megabits per second) service to those properties that are closest, and returning later to connect those that are farther away.

The letter, written by the network’s chairman, Heather Stallard, has gone out to Devon MPs Neil Parish, Gary Streeter, Sarah Wollaston, Anne Marie Morris and Sir Hugo Swire, and James Heappey, David Warburton and Rebecca Pow, who have Somerset constituencies.

The CDS-led project has a history of problems and delays and there has been an at-times troubled relationship between the body and the region’s MPs.

In October the same eight MPs labelled CDS’ handling of the two-phase £117million rollout programme as “dire”, accusing the organisation of “a dearth of transparency” and acting slowly.

In turn, Somerset County Council economy portfolio holder David Hall said the MPs were “hypocritical”.

‘It is clear that a solution needs to be put in place’

Graham Long