Broadband coverage assessed as government 2015 target approaches
With the end of 2015 approaching, the government has a soft target to achieve of getting 90 per cent of the UK access to superfast broadband.
Officially the government has said it wants to roll out superfast broadband to reach 95 per cent of Britain by the end of 2017. Data released by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport in August indicated that the government is on course to meet this target, but thinkbroadband.com has reviewed just how much progress has been made.
Looking at each region of the UK, the website has conducted its monthly review of what percentage of different areas have access to superfast broadband. As of 4 October, London led the way with 92.9 per cent of premises able to access broadband speeds of 24 Mbps or greater, which is a 0.2 per cent increase from 6 September.
Conversely, the two areas of the UK with the worst broadband connectivity are Scotland and Northern Ireland. At present 79.2 per cent of Scottish premises can access superfast broadband, a rise of 1.6 per cent on a month ago. Meanwhile, bottom of the list is Northern Ireland, with 76.6 per cent able to access superfast broadband, although 94.5 per cent can access fibre broadband - a figure that is only beaten by London (95.2 per cent) and the South East (95.4 per cent).
Concerns have been raised that the most remote parts of the UK - including rural areas of Scotland and Northern Ireland - are going to be overlooked for superfast broadband roll-outs due to the huge costs associated with servicing these areas.
In the east of England, 85.2 per cent of homes and business can access superfast broadband. However, this figure set to rise; the government has announced plans this week to spend an additional £5.3 million on the ongoing project to roll out superfast connections across Norfolk.
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