From Bristol24-7 www.bristol247.com
Bristol City Council leader Barbara Janke has welcomed the Government’s push to increase broadband speeds in the city – but wants speeds of 100Mbps commonplace for businesses.
Her comments follow an announcement by Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt yesterday that he wanted to turn Britain’s internet “not spots” into hot spots by allocating a £530m fund for broadband-starved communities.
The lack of Superfast Broadband is seen as a brake on economic development in Bristol, particularly among its bandwidth-hungry creative industries. Superfast Broadband will be one of the key elements in Bristol’s Enterprise Zone planned for derelict land around Temple Meads station.
Mr Hunt is expected to announce how the money, diverted from the BBC to create a ‘digital Britain’ will be shared among 40 areas including English councils, Scotland and Northern Ireland. A further £300m has been promised after 2015
The Government wants all 25m UK homes to have access to a minimum speed of 2Mbps. If all goes to plan, 90% of homes will be able to get even faster speeds of over 24Mbps.
Areas set to benefit around Bristol include Bradley Stoke, which for years has suffered from poor speeds. Ministers said almost 55,000 homes and businesses across Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset, and South Gloucestershire did not have a basic 2Mbps service and could not rely on the private sector to improve their connection.
Cllr Janke said: “It is very good news that Government is investing in Superfast Broadband and today’s announcement is a good start. However, I look forward to the day when it is commonplace for all Bristol’s businesses to have access to broadband speeds in excess of 100Mbps and for our creative companies to have access to upload and download speeds that are even higher than this.
“We need to keep on the front-foot if we are to continue to deliver economic growth in these difficult times and access to the highest possible speeds is vital.”
