Digital Connectivity in 2023.
By FEP Director David Trevelyan
The government identified Digital Connectivity as a cornerstone of the UK's Industrial Strategy. This was massively underpinned by the Covid pandemic from 2020, where a huge swathe of the population suddenly found they were working and learning online. This shone a light on some of the weaknesses of UK broadband provision. 10mbps is OK for occasional use, but suddenly struggles if lots of people are using broadband in the house. Even 40mbps starts to struggle with modern usage patterns!
Digital connectivity is generally thought about in terms of mobiles, watching Youtube, and streaming Netflix. However, the future is a lot more complicated than that, beyond the obvious benefits of home and hybrid working, the government strategy talks about agri-tech (Hartpury University), digital industry, and more locally Gloucestershire has a very strong “Cyber” theme to its future growth strategy. Away from work, digital infrastructure will support communities with more traditional services, whether transport, shopping, medicine or welfare.
Regardless of your engagement with our digital footprint, it’s an area that will grow and can provide us with great opportunities. This is why FEP have worked hard to support the Forest of Dean and fly the flag for the importance of digital connectivity for the future of our area.
Superfast to Ultrafast Broadband (2012 to 2023)
The Forest of Dean has benefited from a Digital revolution over the last decade, especially in the last five years.
Credit is due to the team at Fastershire, who have supported the deployment of superfast broadband across the Forest of Dean and further afield in Gloucestershire and Herefordshire.
To recap, Fastershire has supported superfast broadband deployment over the last decade. Over the first three stages, this has enabled the BT network to provide Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) across the area. This has enabled 1000's of properties across the district to access speeds up to 80mbps (The market calls this "Superfast Fibre", or "Fibre Plus").
Stage 4 has supercharged out broadband connectivity, most areas will recognise the building that has gone on by Gigaclear, Full Fibre, and other providers. This rollout is the provision of the future of broadband and provides Ultrafast Broadband (Up to 1000mbps).
Stage 4 has now been overtaken by Stage 5, and this is where the FEP has stepped in. Whilst Stages 1 – 4 were about provision to the vast majority of areas, Stage 5 has been about supporting obvious but missed areas. We've helped the communities of Churcham and Cinderford have their ultrafast broadbrand rolled out.
The Future is Ultrafast (2023 Onwards)
This brings us up to 2023 and the future. As with everything the way these schemes are being funded and deployed is changing. This year the government has launched project Gigabit:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/project-gigabit-uk-gigabit-programme
This funding scheme will be split into two areas. One will be similar to the current Fastershire approach where funding for areas will be put in place, with commercial operators (BT, Gigaclear etc) bidding for the work. Secondly there will be the Gigabit Voucher Scheme which allows people to claim up to £4500 to help broadband get to your home.
What Next?
Unfortunately there's an element of watch this space, however if you are still one of the homes or businesses in the Forest of Dean who doesn't have decent broadband, there are a few things you can do:
- Ensure that you've set up your home router properly.
- A) Look on comparison sites to see if you can get a better deal with a better speed (and newer kit)
- B) For services like Gigaclear, they may not appear on comparison sites. Have a look at the Address Checker on the Fastershire Site
If you don't get the speed you need there are a number of options
- For immediate solutions consider 4G/5G connections and Satellite (e.g. Starlink, fastershire) and other bespoke solutions
- Register on the Fastershire Site
- Have a look on the Gigabit Voucher page and register