Posted: 02nd Nov, 2010 By: MarkJ

The UK government has released a new
White Paper that focuses upon how it intends to empower locally driven growth, which included mention of using new
Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEP) to help deploy "
super-fast" broadband internet access services around the country.
So far 24 LEP's have been given the green light, although it's not clear if any are broadband related. It's understood that none have actually been given any money and must instead make their proposals for such cash via the £1.4bn
Regional Growth Fund (RGF). This is entirely separate from the £530m already set aside for
universal 2Mbps (USC) and
super-fast rural broadband projects.
Broadband and super-fast connectivity [White Paper Quote]
B.48 Broadband Delivery UK is leading a national programme to deliver the best superfast broadband network in Europe by 2015, ensuring at the same time that virtually everybody has access to a decent level of broadband connectivity.
There could be a role for local enterprise partnerships to provide local leadership of projects and interventions working in close partnership with communities and local agencies as well as with the private sector, with BDUK providing overall co-ordination and strategic guidance.
In reality LEP's appear to be little more than a poorly funded replacement for Labour's previous
Regional Development Agencies (RDA), which also involved themselves in a number of broadband related projects. It's understood that the first round of bids for funding are requested by 21st January 2011. We don't expect more than a few token broadband projects to benefit from this.
Local UK Growth White Paper
http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/regional/docs/l/cm7961-local-growth-white-paper.pdf