15
September
2016
|
15:00
Europe/London

Warwickshire villages enjoy technology boost as CSW Broadband roll-out reaches more remote communities

Summary
Arley, Barton, Blackwell, Ettington, Harborough Magna, Long Lawford, Model Village, Nether Whitacre, Over Whitacre, Shustuke, Sutton-under-Brailes and Water Orton are latest communities to benefit from the CSW Broadband roll-out, led by Warwickshire County Council and BT, as part of the Government's Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK) programme.

WARWICKSHIRE VILLAGES ENJOY TECHNOLOGY BOOST AS

CSW BROADBAND ROLL-OUT REACHES MORE REMOTE COMMUNITIES

Arley, Barton, Blackwell, Ettington, Harborough Magna, Long Lawford, Model Village, Nether Whitacre, Over Whitacre, Shustuke, Sutton-under-Brailes and Water Orton are latest communities to benefit

The pace of life in several of Warwickshire’s smallest villages is set to speed up following the arrival of faster fibre broadband.

The roll-out of new technology is part of the CSW Broadband project led by Warwickshire County Council and BT, as part of the Government’s Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK) programme.

Areas of Arley, Barton, Ettington, Blackwell, Long Lawford, Model Village, Nether Whitacre, Over Whitacre, Shustuke and Water Orton are the latest to benefit, with parts of Sutton-under-Brailes and Harborough Magna now able to access superfast fibre broadband for the first time.

Households and businesses opting for an upgrade will be able to access broadband download speeds of up to 80 megabits per second (Mbps) and uploads of up to 20Mbps*.

So far, around 53,000 premises have been able to connect to faster fibre broadband as a result of the CSW Broadband roll-out, which boasts one of the highest take-up rates in the UK, with around one-third of households and businesses that are able to upgrade, chosing to do so.

Benefits of using faster fibre broadband are wide-ranging and include:

  • Maintaining a more reliable internet connection;
  • Being able to send emails with large attachments in seconds;
  • Watching catch-up TV and streaming videos without buffering;
  • Doing online studies, shopping, banking and accessing other internet-based services more easily and quickly;
  • Connecting more than one device to the internet at the same time, without the connection dropping out;
  • Uploading larges files and photos faster;
  • Updating information on a website more easily and quickly.

Councillor Alan Cockburn, Cabinet Portfolio Holder for Finance and Property at Warwickshire County Council, said: “We said from the start that this project was about bringing faster broadband to those areas that would not have been reached through providers’ commercial programmes. We can see the evidence that shows how villages and communities across the area are now benefitting from the new technology – and there is still a lot more to come!”

Colin Bannon, BT’s Regional Director for Warwickshire and the West Midlands, said: “It’s important that people living and working in the more rural parts of Warwickshire have the same access to new technology as those elsewhere, which is what this part of the CSW Broadband roll-out is all about.

“Using fibre broadband makes everything you do online easier and faster. Nowadays more people want the option of working from home or running a business from home, which is so much easier when you have access to faster fibre broadband because the technology makes it easier to share large files and other information.

“Fibre’s also great for families wanting to connect different devices to the internet at the same time because it provides a much stronger, more reliable broadband connection.”

Warwickshire County Councillor, Philip Johnson, Chair of the Communities Overview and Scrutiny Committee, said: “So many people these days take superfast broadband for granted, and forget what life was like before. This is great news for these communities, but we are increasingly seeing people moving into new homes and finding that the developers have made no superfast provision, so we would urge people to check before buying a property that superfast broadband is available.”

Local people can get more information from the CSW Broadband website – www.cswbroadband.org.uk – and via Twitter and Facebook.

Upgrading to fibre broadband does not happen automatically. It’s an ‘opt in’ service, but because the network is being installed by Openreach – BT’s local network business - it is ‘open’, so residents and businesses wanting to upgrade have a wide choice of fibre broadband service providers.

Note to Editors

*These are the top wholesale speeds available from Openreach to all service providers; speeds offered by service providers may vary.

The CSW Broadband roll-out is using a mixture of technologies. These include Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP), which provides speeds up to 330Mbps and upload speeds of up to 30Mbps; and Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC), which provides download speeds of up to 80Mbps and download speeds of up to 20Mbps. In addition there are some premises that are currently connected directly to the telephone exchange rather than via a green roadside cabinet, sometimes known as Exchange Only (EO) lines. In order to connect EO lines, further roadside cabinets have to be installed.

About CSW Broadband

The expansion of the CSW Broadband roll-out is known as Contract 2, Part 1, and was announced in February 2015. The deal was spearheaded by Warwickshire County Council and Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council, which are contributing an initial £3.68 million and £0.38 million respectively, with an additional £2.61m from BT and a further £4.06m from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s Superfast Extension Programme (SEP).

When complete, it will increase the percentage of homes and businesses able to access high-speed fibre broadband in Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire to nearly 94 per cent when combined with the first phase of the CSW Broadband roll-out already underway and the private sector investments of companies like BT.

The first part of the CSW Broadband roll-out is known as Contract 1.

As the property-level mapping is still in development, the CSW Broadband team is asking people to check the map at www.cswbroadband.org.uk and to report any discrepancies by using the simple online form.

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Issued by Warwickshire County Council and BT on behalf of the CSW Broadband partnership.

For more information please contact Leigh Hunt at the CSW Broadband project office on 01926 738339 or email: broadband@cswbroadband.org.uk

Or Emma Tennant at the BT regional press office on 0800 085 0660 or email: emma.tennant@bt.com Twitter: @EmmaTennantBT

All BT news releases can be accessed at our web site: http://www.btplc.com/News

About Superfast Britain

Superfast Britain is a Government programme of investment in broadband and communication infrastructure across the UK. Run by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, this investment helps businesses to grow, creates jobs and will make Britain more competitive in the global race.

The portfolio is comprised of three elements:

  1. £790m to extend superfast broadband to 95% of the UK by 2017;
  2. £150m to provide high-speed broadband to businesses in 22 cities; and
  3. £150m to improve quality and coverage of mobile phone and basic data network services.

    Administered on behalf of Government by Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK), Superfast Britain is transforming Britain by promoting growth, enabling skills and learning, and improving quality of life.

    For further information: https://www.gov.uk/broadband-delivery-uk

About BT

BT’s purpose is to use the power of communications to make a better world. It is one of the world’s leading providers of communications services and solutions, serving customers in 180 countries. Its principal activities include the provision of networked IT services globally; local, national and international telecommunications services to its customers for use at home, at work and on the move; broadband, TV and internet products and services; and converged fixed-mobile products and services. BT consists of six customer-facing lines of business: Consumer, EE, Business and Public Sector, Global Services, Wholesale and Ventures, and Openreach.

For the year ended 31 March 2016, BT Group’s reported revenue was £19,042m with reported profit before taxation of £3,029m.

British Telecommunications plc (BT) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of BT Group plc and encompasses virtually all businesses and assets of the BT Group. BT Group plc is listed on stock exchanges in London and New York.

For more information, visit www.btplc.com