Freedom Fibre Reopens UK Community Fund with £500 Grants

Network operator Freedom Fibre, which is supported by UK broadband ISP TalkTalk and aims to cover over 2 million premises in England and Wales with their Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network, has re-opened their “Freedom Fund” and is now offering more money to help community projects (£500 per scheme).

Just to recap, the operator initially set aside a total of £4,000 for their new fund at the end of 2022 (potentially rising to £60k by the end of 2023), which had been open to non-profit groups and was welcoming applications for up to £250 per community project. The somewhat experimental fund then closed to applications after awarding grants to 13 local community schemes (here).

The fund has today been re-launched for communities in areas where Freedom Fibre are currently deploying and related environmental projects can apply for up to £500 worth of funding. Access to the fund is currently limited to the locations listed below and must be made before 5pm on Friday 21st July 2023.

• Atherton, Wigan
• Comberbach, Cheshire
• Culcheth, Cheshire
• Eccles, Salford
• Ellesmere Port, Cheshire
• Hartford, Cheshire
• Irlam, Salford
• Leigh, Wigan
• Newton-le-Willows
• Northwich, Cheshire
• Stockton Heath, Cheshire
• Urmston, Trafford
• Walkden, Salford
• Weaverham, Cheshire
• Whitchurch, Shropshire

Neil McArthur, CEO of Freedom Fibre, said: “Last year, we became England’s first alt-net to establish a community fund that supports the environmental projects in the communities where we are rolling out our network. We’re building on last year’s successes by extending our fund to reach an even broader range of community groups, and I can’t wait to see what applications we receive this time round.”

The operator itself, which is currently being backed by an investment of £84m from Equitix and a £16m Santander debt facility, now covers “approximately” 95,000 premises passed (up from 40,000 at their last update in Nov 2022) and they have a goal to expand to over 150,000 properties through 2023.