Broadband
Business, Innovation and Skills
Written answers and statements, 5 November 2009
John Battle (Leeds West, Labour)
To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills what recent estimate he has made of the proportion of households which have access to high-speed broadband internet; and if he will make a statement.
Stephen Timms (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; East Ham, Labour)
While there is currently no figure for the number of households in the United Kingdom connected to high speed broadband internet, approximately 12 million households are within reach of fast broadband via Virgin Media's cable network. This covers approximately 50 per cent. of all UK households. BT announced its plans to invest £1.5 billion in a fibre-based super-fast broadband network. They plan to have the service available to one million households by March 2010 and the service should be available to around 40 per cent. of the UK's homes and businesses by 2012. They are currently rolling out superfast broadband to 10,000 homes in Ebbsfleet and have a 40Mbps service pilot scheme to 15,000 homes in Muswell Hill and Whitchurch.
Other high speed broadband developments include H20's Fibrecity scheme to 88,000 homes in Bournemouth and Dundee and Redstone's scheme serving 5,000 homes in Belfast.