Efforts to deliver superfast broadband to about a million rural homes have been quietly abandoned by ministers, who allege that most of those in remote locations won’t want it.
Sajid Javid, now the business secretary, said that he hoped to “spread the benefits of superfast broadband”, defined as 25 megabits per second (Mbps), to the “final 5 per cent” of homes a year ago.
Mr Javid, who was culture secretary at the time, commissioned trials on how to reach those not covered by the 95 per cent roll-out to be complete by the end of next year.
That effort has been quietly abandoned on the ground that it is unaffordable and that most of the rural homes to be denied superfast broadband won’t want it in any case.
Instead about a million homes will have to settle for 10 Mbps, the minimum that internet companies are obliged to deliver. David Cameron introduced the “universal service obligation” (USO) to put broadband on the same footing as other essential utilities, such as electricity and water, last year.
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Spelling out the benefits of broadband at the higher 25 Mbps, Mr Javid said they were “clear from increasing productivity and economic growth to transforming family entertainment at home”.
A consultation document for the USO argues that it is “unlikely” that most people in remote areas will want speeds of 24 Mbps “even if that option is made available to them”.
“So we do not believe that an additional broadband roll-out programme at this time is proportionate or would represent value for money,” it states
The decision was condemned by a leading campaigner for better rural broadband, who accused ministers of settling for “rural digital apartheid”.
Graham Long, chairman of Broadband for Rural Devon and Somerset, said: “Businesses moving out of rural areas here in Devon and Somerset because they cannot keep their website — their shop window — up to date.
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“It will be even worse if they only have 10 Mbps in 2020, because the need for better bandwidth will have grown by then now that we have cloud computing and other shared applications.”
In some areas — of East Yorkshire, Devon, Cumbria and the Cotswolds, for example — more than a fifth of premises could be stuck with the legal minimum of 10 Mbps.
The Department for Culture, Media & Sport has now argued, in its consultation, that a broadband speed of 10 Mbps “enables full participation in our digital society”.
It allows “watching video on demand, listening to internet radio or streamed music, using social media, accessing government services, shopping online and working from home”, the consultation states.
A spokesman said that about £250 million to be clawed back from the existing broadband supplier, BT, would pay to push the proportion of the country with superfast coverage a little higher than 95 per cent.
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He defended the decision, saying: “At the present time, we can’t realistically deliver a further programme that would represent value for money.”