Wales UK Given GBP20 Million Broadband Funding Boost

The Welsh Government has today announced a further £20m to help the existing investment of £425m deliver faster broadband ISP services, which will initially see 96% of homes and businesses in Wales being given access to download speeds of up to 80Mbps (FTTC) by the end of 2015.

The £20m consists of an additional £10m in 2014-15 for faster broadband to “ensure universal access by 2015“, which also builds on another £10m that is being allocated in 2013-14 for Next Generation Broadband Wales from the Centrally Retained Capital Fund.

Jane Hutt, Welsh Finance Minister, said:

“This £175m package of capital investment will make a real difference, by delivering longer term benefits for the economy and, vitally, better infrastructure for our key public services. It builds on the sustained programme of interventions and actions we have made in the Welsh economy worth nearly half a billion pounds in order to support businesses in Wales during these challenging times.

We want a Wales with a strong economy, a Wales with 21st Century networks for transport, IT and energy, a low-carbon Wales and a skilled and efficient Wales with strong public services.”

The wider Digital Wales Strategy envisages a roll-out of 30Mbps (Megabits per second) capable superfast broadband ISP services to reach 100% of the country’s businesses by the middle of 2016 and households by 2020.