Government launches rural broadband projects

Hunt announced three feasibility studies

Culture secretary Jeremy Hunt today laid down government thinking on rural broadband and launched new projects to kick-start its digital economy plans.

Hunt confirmed the launch of three market-testing projects to try to bridge the broadband gap between urban communities and those in rural areas.

However, no details emerged of where the projects would be sited.

Malcolm Corbett, chief executive of the Independent Networks Co-operative Association (INCA), said INCA was already working with example projects that could become pilot schemes for Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK).

BDUK is the government body tasked with delivering UK-wide broadband.

Corbett added, “We’re keen to work with [the government] in defining partnerships that can prove successful at extending next-generation network access rollout.”

Hunt also announced plans to reform local cross-media ownership rules, and asked UK communications regulator Ofcom to look at the case for removing all these rules at a local level.

Head of UK investment banking at Lazard, Nicholas Shott, has been appointed by Hunt to independently assess local TV over the summer, after which Hunt’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport will publish its plans in the autumn.

The plans for independent news consortia funded through "top-slicing" the BBC licence fee will be dropped. That funding will instead be used to support the rollout of superfast broadband and has been calculated at about £250m per year up to 2012.

Hunt concluded: “The action plan I have set out today will help create a broadband infrastructure that will stand comparison with anywhere in the world. "