Northern Ireland announces £165m full-fibre rollout funded by 2017 DUP agreement with Theresa May's UK government
- Reference: 1605713408
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/11/18/northern_ireland_fibrus_deal/
- Source link:
The initiative – called Project Stratum – will target regions where the prevailing speeds are under 30Mbps. These will largely be concentrated in the area described by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency as "Band H", which mostly consists of open countryside. Deployment is slated to start immediately and forecast to conclude in March 2024.
Project Stratum is largely a direct result of the 2017 Confidence and Supply agreement between the Theresa May government and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). This controversial pact saw Northern Ireland [1]promised £1bn in additional central government funding in exchange for the DUP propping up May's minority government.
The bulk of the costs – £150m – will come from this pool, with the remaining £15m in funding secured from DAERA (Northern Ireland's Department of Agriculture, Environment, and Rural Affairs).
Fibrus was long regarded front-runner for the Project Stratum contract, beating BT-owned Openreach. The firm, a joint-venture between B4B chief Dominic Kearns and Irish ISP Enet founder Conal Henry, is a relative newcomer to the space, and was only founded in September 2018. Since its inception, the startup has led gigabit deployments across the region, deploying full-fibre connections to towns across South Down, Mid Ulster, and North Antrim.
This is the second major bit of broadband good news to hit Northern Ireland this month, following Virgin Media's announcement it had [2]expanded gigabit connectivity to all customers in the region .
Fibrus Networks chair Conal Henry commented: "This investment partnership with the NI Executive positions Northern Ireland as a digital global leader. Full-fibre broadband is key to unlocking the full economic and social potential of our rural communities and is as vital a part of our 21st century infrastructure as power, water or transport.
"This investment enables towns, villages and rural communities to change the narrative, keep people and communities connected and facilitate the increasing demand for working and studying at home. The benefits of Full Fibre Broadband are more relevant now in a COVID context than ever before."
UK Digital Secretary Oliver Dowden added: "This £150m investment from the UK government will help deliver lightning fast gigabit speeds not just to Northern Ireland's towns and cities but also to rural areas stuck in the digital slow lane. As the impact of COVID has shown us, it is more important than ever that we connect people to their families, jobs and services." ®
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[1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/06/26/arlene-foster-meet-theresa-may-finalise-dup-deal-prop-tory-minority/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2020/11/05/virgin_media_q3/
[3] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Hmm
With Nissan probably on the way out of the UK, and I'm sure that Toyota, BMW and PSA will soon follow we'll be paying for BREXIT for the next 50+ years.
But where's Farage? Isn't he helping his mate Donald keep on saying 'I won, I won, I won bigly'.
This whole thing has been a disaster from start to finish. Farage, BoJo, Reece-Mogg et all lied and lied and sadly people believed them. Just like those who voted for Trump. Everything he said was lies.
Re: Hmm
Give it a rest, Brexit has happened. Either get over it and get on with your life, or go moan somewhere else.
Re: Hmm
Yes, lets al, fade away quietly.
Anyway, big bang Brexit got usurped by the big big bang coronavirus
Re: Hmm
"Give it a rest, Brexit has happened."
No. It happens on Jan 1st. You ain't seen nothing yet.
And with the version of Brexit NI gets including a border in the Irish Sea broadband will be the least of their problems.
Re: Hmm
That's democracy for you (and I say that as a remain voter). Sometimes you get the party and ideas you like, sometimes you don't. The alternative where an 'elite' group decide what policies are best and the rest of us just go along with it doesn't really bear thinking about.
Both sides 'lied'. It's called politics. Vote leave exaggerated the benefits and ease of leaving. Vote remain exaggerated the disaster that would befall us if we even dared to vote leave, let alone actually go through with it. I'm still waiting for the emergency budget and interest rate rises we were told would happen within days of a leave result.
Hmm
Good on them. Shame May wasted her time refusing to get brexit done.