Openreach to deliver fibre to 3.2m extra homes as it slams government inaction
BT’s infrastructure arm Openreach has pledged to extend its fibre service to 3.2m extra homes by 2025, as it said the government was “running out of time” to meet its connectivity targets.
Openreach today unveiled plans to bring full-fibre broadband to the UK’s “hard-to-reach” areas, as part of BT’s £12bn plan to connect more than 20m homes to fibre optic cables over the next decade.
But the division’s chief executive slammed ministers for moving too slowly with the Prime Minister’s plans to have full-fibre “gigabit broadband sprouting in every home” by the end of 2025, as part of a wider move to “level up” rural Britain.
“We need that plan now,” Clive Selley told the BBC. “And we need to get kicked off on the build now.”
In its General Election manifesto last year, the Conservative party pledged to plug £5bn into plans to deliver high-speed internet to the hardest-to-reach parts of the UK.
However, Selley today urged the government to “go fast, because we’re running out of time — even with five years to go.”
Openreach today published its three-year plan to build full fibre to more than a third of homes considered to be the most challenging to reach in the UK.
The expansion will see high-speed internet made available in 250 towns and villages including Thurso in northern Scotland, Aberystwyth in Wales and Linfield in Surrey.
The scale-up will not be covered by the government’s £5bn connectivity splurge.
It comes as telecoms watchdog Ofcom is expected to scrap a pricing cap on parts of Openreach’s copper network, which will allow the BT unit to increase its prices in line with inflation.
Openreach is currently grappling with the aftermath of the government’s decision to U-turn on a deal with Huawei allowing the Chinese vendor to build part of the UK’s 5G infrastructure.
All Huawei 5G kit must now be removed from UK networks by 2027, after the PM bowed to political pressure to scrap the deal over national security concerns.
Huawei kit made up around 44 per cent of the UK’s fibre networks, including BT’s 5G technology.
BT has signed up a new deal with US firm Adtran to provide fibre equipment, in addition to its main supplier Nokia.
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