RURAL AREAS in Fermanagh appear destined to remain without superfast broadband according to correspondence from Enterprise Minister Jonathan Bell.
Fermanagh and Omagh District Council sent a letter to the minister on February 18 detailing their concerns in relation to broadband provision in the district and a reply was received on March 22.
In the correspondence the minister offers little optimism that fibre optic broadband will be rolled out across Fermanagh in the near future. First acknowledging the concerns of the council Mr Bell then states the challenges of meeting the council’s requirements.
“I acknowledge the council’s opinion regarding a fibre-to-the-home solution, but the deployment of such technology is neither as easy nor as affordable as you suggest. FTTH (or Fibre-to-the Premise – FTTP), as with all fibre based technologies, needs to be cost effective and it is the case that the prohibitive expense of delivering such an option would mean that it is only viable as one of a range of solutions to deliver superfast broadband.”
The minister outlined that FTTP was one of the solutions being deployed under his department’s Northern Ireland Broadband Improvement Project “where it is economically viable to do so” and has already been made available to “some parts of the Fermanagh and Omagh District Council area.”
Local Independent councillor Bernice Swift has slammed Mr Bell’s response to the council and cited the “abysmal provision” in her area of Derrygonnelly.
“The response from the DETI Minister provides absolutely no promising indication or concerted effort to address fibre broadband provision for rural Fermanagh, instead provides excuses that this is not either easy or affordable, my response to the Minister is, make it easy and make it affordable and do it now. For far too long rural Fermanagh are at the receiving end of continued failures by Stormont departments to effectively address the gaps and requirements in services.”
In his correspondence the Minister provides information of a satellite broadband support scheme and a satellite broadband market test pilot, but Cllr Swift insists this is not good enough.
“The Minister’s offer to provide pilot and support schemes falls short once again indicating it will only happen where it is economically viable to do so. Whenever the rural ratepayer views the contribution to DETI through their regional rate, I’m sure like myself, they will feel totally affronted that any money taken from us personally is neither affordable or viable especially when there is absolutely no benefit felt from this public spending in rural Fermanagh.”
Local UUP councillor Victor Warrington was another distinctly unimpressed with the minister’s response.
“It’s a typical East of the Bann Minister response. It seems once you get the length of Portadown the world ends. It’s out and out discrimination.”
Mr Warrington also voiced reservations over satellite broadband, having used the service a number of years ago. He called the service “temperamental” and stressed it can be an expensive option.
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