Councils should do more on rural broadband

Cllr John Andrews, a Conservative councillor on Colchester District Council, says getting broadband to villages would be a genuine investment. BT need a nudge.

Most people know the great importance of High Speed Broadband in rural areas to increase the attractiveness of sites for businesses with high value add to generate wealth in the community.  My definition of High Speed suitable for business is a line at no more than current business ADSL line costs offering UPLOAD speeds of around 10 to 30 Million bits a second and somewhat faster DOWNLOAD speeds.  The relatively high ration of UPLOAD to DOWNLOAD speeds is thought necessary to make
information provision (which might include software and media distribution, complex plans and designs and suchlike) attractive from remote suppliers and thus give the rural businesses comparability with the best in other countries.

A fairly recent meeting was held at which a nearby County Council CEO - by all accounts a capable Officer - was present to discuss such matters with BT, effectively the monopoly suppliers of exchanges and 'last mile' telco connections to most premises in the UK.

The CEO reported at a more recent event being aghast at BT's competence as a lean mean competitive technology company when 17 (seventeen!) BT people turned up needing to be introduced to each
other by said CEO.  No wonder BT is dragging its heels!  With all those salaries, benefits, expenses and sick pay to fund clearly there's no room to fund rural high speed broadband for vital economic - and green gains.

The potentially Saintly Eric might insert his oar into the BT mess. Perhaps all that's needed is a simple update to Councillors of the abilities at Rutland and Cumbrian self-help broadband together with an obligation for say Districts, Boroughs and Parishes to raise Public Works loans to facilitate provision of appropriate high speed broadband in the centres of small villages - say within a 300 metre radius of the centre repayment being secured by rights over revenues."