WHEN Dame Arlene Foster hit back on social media at SDLP criticism about what she achieved during her time as an MLA last week, she may have chosen the wrong success to promote her credentials.
‘Try broadband’ she tweeted when responding to a critical tweet from local SDLP Councillor Adam Gannon about her accomplishments while in office.
In 2009, then Enterprise Minister Dame Arlene awarded almost a quarter of a million pounds to help the delivery of broadband services to Northern Ireland’s rural west.
Unfortunately, many homes in Fermanagh today can’t access usable broadband at all.
According to figures from internet provider National Broadband, Fermanagh residents are among the highest number of homes without access to quality broadband in the UK.
The Fermanagh and Omagh District Council area proved to be one of the most likely to be without access to usable broadband in Northern Ireland.
The new data showed that more than 2,500 homes were without access to quality internet, leaving the council area 349th in the 374 local authorities in the UK.
In total, ten of the eleven council areas in Northern Ireland finished in the bottom half of the table when compared to local authorities throughout the UK, with only Belfast edging into the top half at 180 of the 374 authorities.
Northern Ireland along with Scotland and Wales is yet to receive any funding from Project Gigabit, a £5 billion UK government initiative aimed at providing 85 per cent of the UK with gigabit-capable broadband by 2025.
A public review process is currently underway ahead of the rollout of Project Gigabit in the north. Northern Ireland’s Department for Economy launched the public review on June 6th which will conclude later this month.
A government progress report on Project Gigabit last month said that rural areas continue to experience “positive increases in coverage despite their more difficult and sparsely populated deployment environments”.
“Northern Ireland saw a noteworthy growth of nine per cent gigabit-capable broadband across rural premises and a three per cent increase in urban areas,” the government’s progress report said.
“As of the end of May 2023, 8,300 homes and businesses in parts of Northern Ireland had been connected using [Project Gigabit] vouchers. In addition, a further 1,300 vouchers had been issued for connection within the next 12 months.”
However, the figures from National Broadband stated more than 30,000 homes in Northern Ireland are still without usable broadband.
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