Investment in rural area broadband

The Sentinel recently revealed that Limavady Borough Council is in the bottom seven of all the local council areas in the entire United Kingdom in terms of the number of people receiving less than two Megabits per second.

Two Megabits per second is often viewed as the minimum broadband speed required for many of the services available online. The communications watchdog Ofcom, for instance, uses the percentage of households not receiving at least two Megabits per second as one of its measures of an area’s overall broadband speed.

The Limavady Borough had one of the highest percentages of households receiving less than two Megabits per second in the entire United Kingdom, according to Ofcom.

A megabit is a measurement of information which can be transferred between computers over the internet. The BBC, for example, list an internet connection of at least two Megabits per second as a prerequisite to adequately use its iPlayer service.

While most in the Limavady Borough have access to ‘superfast’ internet, often carried via fibre-optic cables, a high percentage of people in the Borough will be used to less than the two megabit standard.

Now, the Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster has announced that responses to a recent public consultation exercise conducted into a plan known as the ‘2Mb Universal Broadband Service’ would be published “after Easter.”

In January this year, the Minister told the Stormont Assembly: “Our lives are increasingly dependent on telecommunications, whether you are shopping online, booking a holiday, doing homework, emailing friends or working from home. I want to ensure that a basic broadband service of 2Mb is available to everyone and to further improve the availability of superfast services.”

The DETI Telecoms Action Plan 2011-15 proposed that it would ‘ensure the continuing provision of access to a broadband service in Northern Ireland, regardless of where you live or do business.’

The UK Government at Westminster has also proposed that virtually all premises across Northern Ireland should be able to access a broadband service with a speed of at least two Megabits per second (Mbps) by 2015 and to provide superfast broadband to at least 90 per cent of premises with speeds in excess of 24 Mbps.

Earlier this week, the Minister announced that responses to the 2Mb Universal Broadband Service consultation would be published “after Easter.”

She said: “Responses to this consultation are intended to assist in defining the areas of intervention

across Northern Ireland, where public funds could be used to improve broadband services, in line with the UK Government objectives.

“Any intervention undertaken, is subject to State Aid rules and guidance, which were recently updated at the end of January 2013. My officials are working with the UK’s National Competence Centre, which is approved to scrutinise such interventions in the UK, to assess the impact that these updated rules have on our intervention plans in Northern Ireland.

“This process has meant that the outcome of the public consultation will not be published until after Easter.”