UPD Deadline for Final £20m UK Rural Community Broadband Fund Extended

The deadline for a final round of bidding on the government’s £20 million Rural Community Broadband Fund (RCBF), which aims to help rural farmers, homes and businesses benefit from faster internet connectivity, has been extended for another three weeks.

The RCBF, which usually works to provide around 50% of any overall project costs, typically focuses upon smaller scale superfast broadband and related business schemes in the last 10% of the United Kingdom’s most “hard to reach” rural areas.

So far around 100 schemes have expressed an interest in securing funding for their efforts and some, such as Fibre GarDen in Crumbria, have already been successful. Sadly the RCBF opened its final (third) round of bidding in March 2013 and the original deadline for this was set as 24th May 2013 (here).

But according to broadband activist John Popham, whom has worked on a number of related projects in Cheshire, Durham, Tees Valley, Kirklees and Cumbria, the official deadline has now been extended to 17th June 2013. This was only announced on Friday and so DEFRA hasn’t yet updated their website to reflect the change.

John Popham said:

“It has been great to work with some of the communities which had been in danger of left behind by the 21st Century, and set them on the road to benefitting from the same new technologies which urban residents now take for granted. It’s not a straightforward task. The technical challenges are one thing; the mindset of people who have never had the internet and don’t necessarily see a reason for having it, is perhaps an even tougher obstacle.

[The RCBF] could be the last chance for communities in the last 10% to have a crack at getting greatly enhanced broadband.”

Admittedly the £20 million on offer through the RCBF is only a drop in the ocean of what would be needed to do the job properly, although it’s nice to have an alternative to the BT dominated Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK) framework that typically focuses on the first 90% of the UK.

Meanwhile the government are still trying to figure out a post-2015 policy for spending that extra £300m from the BBC TV Licence fee, which has already been set aside for plugging any rural broadband gaps in the final 10%.

UPDATE 22nd May 2013

Here’s the official statement, which confirms that so far over 50 applications have been invited to submit final proposals to begin work to bring broadband to their areas.

Environment Minister, Richard Benyon, said:

“Rural broadband is crucial to getting the economy moving and businesses growing. Funding is still available and I don’t want communities to miss out on this great opportunity.

Superfast broadband is transforming the lives of rural businesses and communities by helping them tap into new markets, get better exposure and save time in their working day.”

Speaking of the RCBF. Kirklees councillors have joined forces with Kirkburton and Denby Dale parish councillors to bid for money in the hope of gaining better broadband in local Huddersfield villages.