The UK Government (Building Digital UK) has this evening announced the completion of the “largest public sector broadband project” in Wales, which has enabled 620 public sector sites (hospitals, police stations, libraries etc.) to get access to a lightning-fast full fibre network connection.
The upgrades, which were supported by public investment totalling £11.5 million, have been delivered via both the original Local Full Fibre Networks (LFFN) programme and the follow-on Rural Gigabit Connectivity (RGC) Hubs programme.
Such deployments have tended to adopt the anchor tenancy approach (i.e. public sector sites/organisations become the anchor tenant for a new network), which means that, in theory, nearby businesses and homes could eventually benefit as the network could be expanded to support future Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) services from broadband ISPs (this usually requires additional private investment).
All of this was centred around four projects, which we’ve summarised below.
LFFN & RGC Hub Projects – Details
Cardiff Capital Region LFFN Project
Delivered by the Welsh Government, working with the ten local authorities that make up the Cardiff Capital Region City Deal. £2.5m UK funding, 166 public sites.
Pembrokeshire County Council LFFN Public Sector Project
Delivered by Pembrokeshire County Council. £1m UK funding, 68 public sites.
North Wales LFFN Challenge Fund Project
Denbighshire-led, working with the six local authorities that make up the North Wales Economic Ambition Board. £6.5m UK funding, 311 public sites.
RGC Hub – Rest of Wales Project
Delivered by the Welsh Government, working with 11 rural local authorities in Wales. £0.93m UK funding, 75 public sites.
Julia Lopez, UK Digital Infrastructure Minister, said:
“We’ve funded hundreds of faster broadband upgrades across Wales to put public services in the digital fast lane so they can deliver more for communities.
This is on top of our £5 billion Project Gigabit which will bring better broadband to tens of thousands of rural homes and businesses across Wales and the UK that would otherwise be left behind.”
At present just 30% of homes and businesses in Wales (here) can access a gigabit-capable broadband connection (c.42% for the UK), although commercial deployments are expected to give this a significant boost over the next few years. This reflects major deployments from operators like Openreach (here), Virgin Media (VMO2) and Ogi (here), but a large gap is still expected to remain post-completion.
The Government recently indicated that this could leave “up to” 234,000 premises in hard-to-reach rural areas of Wales (here and here) as potentially being in scope of the new Project Gigabit programme (i.e. they won’t benefit from the commercial build and thus require public subsidy to go further). But it’s likely to be another year or two before we see that plan being turning into physical build.
Finally, you can find a list below of all the locations where public sector sites have been connected under the aforementioned LFFN/RGC programmes.
LFFN / RGC Site Breakdown
Pembrokeshire site breakdown (68):
Crymych – 2
Fishguard – 4
Haverfordwest – 22
Kilgetty – 1
Milford Haven – 11
Narberth – 2
Newport – 2
Pembroke – 2
Pembroke Dock – 11
Saundersfoot – 3
Templeton – 1
Tenby – 7
North Wales site breakdown (311):
Abergele – 6
Amlwch – 1
Bangor – 8
Barmouth – 2
Beaumaris – 1
Betws-y-Coed – 5
Blaenau Ffestiniog – 2
Bodorgan – 1
Caernarfon – 10
Cemaes Bay – 1
Cerrigydrudion – 11
Chester – 3
Colwyn Bay – 16
Conwy – 5
Deeside – 11
Denbigh – 13
Dolgellau – 6
Dolwyddelan – 1
Flint – 4
Harlech – 2
Holyhead – 9
Holywell – 6
Llandudno – 14
Llangefni – 5
Llanerchymedd – 1
Llanfairfechan – 3
Llangollen – 7
Llanidloes – 1
Llanrwst – 6
Llanfair Pwllgwyngyll – 2
Menai Bridge – 1
Mold – 14
Penmaenmawr – 1
Penrhyndeudraeth – 1
Porthmadog – 5
Prestatyn – 3
Pwllheli – 8
Rhuddlan & Rhyl – 27
Ruthin – 16
Star Gaerwen – 1
St Asaph – 6
Trefriw – 2
Tywyn – 2
Ty Goes – 1
Wrexham – 60
Cardiff City Region site breakdown (166):
Aberdare – 2
Abergavenny – 4
Abertillery – 9
Bangoed – 6
Blackwood – 3
Bridgend – 18
Caerphilly – 13
Caldicot – 4
Cardiff – 12
Chepstow – 2
Cwmbran – 8
Ebbw Vale – 7
Ferndale – 4
Hengoed – 2
Maesteg – 3
Merthyr Tydfil – 1
Monmouth – 3
Mountain Ash – 2
Newport – 26
Penarth – 2
Pontypool – 11
Pontypridd – 10
Tredegar – 8
Treharris – 1
Treorchy – 2
Usk – 3
Rest of Wales site breakdown (75)
Hereford – 1
Llandrindod – 1
Brecon – 4
Llanwrtyd – 2
Knighton – 1
Presteigne – 1
Llangollen – 1
Corwen – 4
Betws y Coed – 1
Llanrwst – 1
Conwy – 2
Dolgellau – 2
Blaenau Ffestiniog – 1
Barmouth – 1
Porthmadog – 1
Caernarfon – 2
Bangor – 1
Menai Bridge – 1
Rhosneigr – 1
Amlwch – 1
Benllech – 2
Gors Felin – 1
Glynneath – 2
Gwaun Cae – 2
Meddygfa – 2
Swansea – 3
Whitland – 2
Newcastle Emlyn – 2
Llanybydder – 1
Cardigan – 4
Lampeter – 1
St Davids – 2
Narberth – 1
Tenby – 2
Pembroke – 3
Montgomery – 1
Llanidloes – 2
Machynilleth – 2
Welshpool – 5
Llanfyllin – 2
Aberystwyth – 3
Tregaron – 1
@Mark Minor spelling error
Third paragraph starts with
“Such deployments have tended to adopt the anchor tendency approach”
should the word tendency be replaced with the word “tenancy”
+ it might be worth a sentence to explain what the approach means as it has wider relevance across the other UK nations as well.
Feel free to delete this comment once done etc.
Whenever I hear this about public sector sites, I immediately think, is this one of those “great – the council will be far more efficient now”, or is it “great – the council staff can browse TikTok faster”, or even “great – the council staff can now work from home”
All said in jest of course!
The reality being nearly all Welsh public sector orgs have signed up to the PSBA (now operated by BT Global Services). So these LFFN grants have just gone towards funding Openreach ECCs.
It would be interesting to see per project numbers on what the grant went to fund, for example the £1m spent in Pembrokeshire for the 68 sites, how much of that went to the PSBA towards ECCs vs staff project costs vs new hardware in schools and council buildings.
Also curious if any of this funding (not just in Pembrokeshire) went towards fibre installation which will remain the asset of the public sector org, e.g private duct / strand installs which have long time value.