£32m superfast broadband on its way in Lancashire, helping wealthy rural communities shop faster...

£32m superfast broadband is on its way courtesy of Lancashire Council Council, enabling wealthy rural communities to shop faster.

Lancashire County Council will bring superfast broadband to 97% of the county by 2014 at speeds in excess of 30 Mbps. Superfast broadband is already available to approximately two-thirds of Lancashire - the less affluent urban areas.

The scheme will create just 25 new jobs and train 20 new apprenticeships. As part of the roll-out, a £3m fund will be established to help small and medium sized businesses in rural areas get the best out of superfast broadband.

Public sector funding for the scheme is expected to come from:

• £10.8m from Broadband Delivery UK
• £16.5m from the European Regional Development Fund
• £4.7m from Lancashire County Council


In addition, the County Council will set up a £500,000 community fund aimed at working with communities to get superfast broadband to those few remote properties not reached under the main scheme.

Geoff Driver, leader of Lancashire County Council, stated: "it will revolutionise the way that people in the county, especially in rural or deprived areas, connect to the wider world."

I understand that there is rural poor. Anyone searching Hansard during the Parliamentary debate over when the Tories scrapped the Agricultural Wages Board will see that this is the case. One can't help feeling that this policy is at complete odds with that the Tory County Council Leader. Cynically I don;t think this is aimed at the rural poor. Much of Lancashire's rural hinterland is a playground for the wealthy.

The optimism is incredible. This will create 25 new jobs. The reality is factories are not going to locate down miles of country lanes where they can't get planning permission and access is prohibitive.

Edwin Booth seems to state this is the second industrial revolution for rural Lancashire;

Edwin Booth, Chairman of the Lancashire Enterprise Partnership, said: ""Superfast broadband has a critical role to play in increasing productivity and innovation across all areas of the economy in Lancashire. We want a thriving economy here in Lancashire and this will help us to achieve it.

"In terms of providing the necessary infrastructure for business in the 21st century, creating this network could be as important as the construction of the canals and railways was to the Industrial Revolution."

Then there is the reality of delivering this. LCC believe they are going to piggy back Electricity North West's over head infrastructure, an infrastructure that is leasehold and has ground rents, that requires the highest standards (and costs) of health & safety dealing with high voltage electrical cables - with commensurate delays and an electrical maintenance contract and approval. Where I am sure much paperwork must be done to reach agreement to roll out.

The reality is this £32m that could have been spent in industrial areas where the benefits would have been far greater, with the that would be far lower. In Hyndburn just 3,000 properties out of 36,000 can't receive super fast broadband (but may receive broadband). LCC refused to release the figures for other constituencies. One has to question why?

The main benefit of this £32m expense is to provide faster internet shopping to wealthy Lancastrian's already living in rural paradise.