South Yorkshire Councils waste £83 million on failed broadband scheme.

[puisseguin 10]

A scheme involving Sheffield, Doncaster, Rotherham & Barnsley Councils to provide Superfast fibre optic broadband to 1.3 million folk has folded today when it emerged the scheme had only 3000 subscribers.

 

A private buyer is being sought to buy the 130 miles of underground cables, but it looks like another white elephant and goodbye to millions of pounds of our money.

[SevenRivers 10]

Why are councils using public money to get involved in the supply of commercial utilities to rival the private sector? Should leave this sort of activity to the commercial sector and the councillors should be surcharged to recover the loss.

[spilldig 190]

Why are councils using public money to get involved in the supply of commercial utilities to rival the private sector? Should leave this sort of activity to the commercial sector and the councillors should be surcharged to recover the loss.

Quite so, it's not the councils job.

[dawny1970 10]

A scheme involving Sheffield, Doncaster, Rotherham & Barnsley Councils to provide Superfast fibre optic broadband to 1.3 million folk has folded today when it emerged the scheme had only 3000 subscribers.

 

A private buyer is being sought to buy the 130 miles of underground cables, but it looks like another white elephant and goodbye to millions of pounds of our money.

no suprised as it only covers 20% of sheffield

 

 

 

Posted from Sheffieldforum.co.uk App for Android

[Stan Tamudo 10]

A scheme involving Sheffield, Doncaster, Rotherham & Barnsley Councils to provide Superfast fibre optic broadband to 1.3 million folk has folded today when it emerged the scheme had only 3000 subscribers.

 

A private buyer is being sought to buy the 130 miles of underground cables, but it looks like another white elephant and goodbye to millions of pounds of our money.

 

Could you provide a link please?

[Fareast 10]

Well, the wastrels and squanderers needn 't worry [ Did they ever ! ]. The stout yeomen of S. Yorkshire will, surely, carry on voting in the same old parties, the same old faces.......as they have been doing blindly for around 90 years now.

Trebles all round !

[Jim Hardie 533]

Why are councils using public money to get involved in the supply of commercial utilities to rival the private sector? Should leave this sort of activity to the commercial sector and the councillors should be surcharged to recover the loss.

 

Because our local councils are full of power drunk, ego-tripping idiots that only have to wear a red rosette to get elected.

[puisseguin 10]

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2013/08/crippling-debt-forces-south-yorkshire-uk-digital-region-network-to-close.html

 

As feared the £100m+ Digital Region broadband network, which acted as an alternative to BT and delivered superfast broadband services to 80% of premises in South Yorkshire (England), has finally fallen under a growing weight of debt and announced its closure.

 

The news follows hot on the heels of a crucial debate last month, which reported that the network would have required up to another £45 million just to survive and yet it only had a customer base of 3,000 subscribers across several ISPs (here).

 

As a result Digital Region and its backers, which include major shareholders alongside Barnsley, Doncaster, Rotherham and Sheffield councils, have agreed that the only solution is a “managed closedown of the network“. Existing customers can expect to be “migrated to alternative networks“, which is now viewed as the “most cost-effective deal for the public“.

 

Digital Region Statement

 

The estimated cost of continuing with the project would be an estimated £95.8 million. Closure of the network would save the taxpayer an estimated £12.5 million, and potentially more, subject to negotiations with existing contractors and customers.

 

Shareholders have been firmly focussed on using Digital Region Limited (DRL) to achieve a significant increase in superfast broadband coverage across South Yorkshire to ensure economic competitiveness did not fall below other parts of the country. This has now largely been achieved by investment by other providers and shareholders had embarked on a re-procurement exercise in March 2012 to facilitate the commercial transfer of the network to another provider.

 

Until this point, the costs of closure and the costs of continuing with the project and realising additional benefits for residents and businesses of South Yorkshire were finely balanced.

[Paddy 10]

There are already several threads on this subject but the below link is the most updated one.

 

http://www.sheffieldforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=964437

 

I just hope BT can now be convinced to take over the running of this network so that some good does come of it.

 

South Yorkshire isn't being allocated any of the BDUK money (because of Digital Region) so those out in the sticks will be waiting a very long time now for decent broadband speeds.

Edited August 15, 2013 by Paddy

[Verdan 10]

Not a surprise, they wanted to charge me almost £300 to "install" which turned out to be "plug it in". Then they told me that it was to replace the BT socket inside the house as they couldn't grantee it was up to spec, despite the house only being built in 2012 and they refused to just send some out to check before handing over the cash and signing up to a deal.

 

Needless to say I went with another provider who went out of their way to get cable into my house and provide me with impeccable service.

[metalman 21]

It's a shame they didn't think about the public purse before they started it.

[Mecky 10]

Why are councils using public money to get involved in the supply of commercial utilities to rival the private sector? Should leave this sort of activity to the commercial sector and the councillors should be surcharged to recover the loss.

 

because private companies wnat government money. This happens all around the country, not just in our region