Bringing faster broadband to our rural areas
Project Update May 2012
Please forward this LINK to your village contacts –
we need to spread the word!
In this month’s update:
Reminder
CSW Broadband now on social media – come and join the conversation
Maps showing Champions and registrations now live on the website
Champions’ packs ready for collection
Business invited to register as potential suppliers
Events in your area – come along to find out more
Do you run a community website, prepare a printed newsletter or send out an e-newsletter?
Questions & Answers
Don’t forget to visit our website: www.cswsuperfastbroadband.org.uk
Reminder
Don’t
forget to complete the surveys on our website – this is how we will
show demand for the service and attract a better outcome from our
procurement to enable us to get superfast broadband cross the widest
possible area www.cswsuperfastbroadband.org.uk
All
Authorities across the country will be going to procurement at the same
time. Bidders will go where there is highest demand, and therefore the
highest return on their investment. Some areas have over 16,000
responses (having started this process before we did). We currently have
over 4800 responses, so there is a long way to go if we are to attract a
good tender response, and only a short time to do it in!
CSW Broadband now on social media – come and join the conversation
We
are now on the major social media channels and are already creating a
buzz. Join in for up-to-date information and an opportunity to influence
how the project develops
Maps showing Champions and registrations now live on the website
You
can zoom in to specific areas and gain a whole range of information.
You can even go right down to street level, although it should be noted
that because the data is mapped to the centre of a postcode it will not
be possible to identify which specific households have completed the
surveys, only the numbers of surveys completed. Because of data
protection we are not able to identify Champions or survey respondents
individually, but if you wish to reach your local Champion please
contact your parish council for details.
Champions’ packs ready for collection
For those areas where we have Champions registered we have now prepared Champions packs. These include:
· Posters
· Flyers
· Postcards
· Business cards
· Guidance on running a local campaign and other resources that are available
Business invited to register as potential suppliers
Once
we go out to tender the potential contractors will be encouraged to use
local suppliers and sub-contractors wherever possible. We are creating a
register of local companies that could sub-contract into the project,
which includes everything from ground works and civil engineering
through surveying to wireless provision and many more fields. To be in
with a chance of benefitting from this opportunity please register your business: http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/suppliers/supplier-registration. Your
details will then be published on our project website and made
available to companies on the BDUK Framework through our data room.
Please
note that inclusion in this register does not in any way imply that
these businesses have been “approved” by Warwickshire County Council,
and does not guarantee that these businesses will receive work through
the project.
Events in your area – come along to find out more
We
will be holding events in each of the Boroughs/Districts throughout the
project. The first events to help you find out more about the superfast
broadband project have been run in Rugby, North Warwickshire and
Stratford and the final one of this series is detailed below. More are
planned in the autumn
Tuesday 22nd May 2012
|
Committee Room 2,
Shire Hall, Warwick
|
From 7pm to 8:30pm
|
Do you run a community website, prepare a printed newsletter or send out an e-newsletter?
We
are preparing monthly bulletins for use in electronic or printed form
so that you can simply cut and paste them into your own publications. If
you would like to receive these updates please email broadband@warwickshire.gov.uk stating UPDATES in the message subject
Questions & Answers
How do I find my Local Broadband Champion?
Because
of data protection we are not able to publish individuals’ contact
details on our website. All Champions are being asked to inform the
local parish council what they are doing, so the parish Clerk should
have this information, although it may take a week or two for the
Champions to contact the Clerks.
I don’t have a Champion in my area, how do I become one?
What do Champions do?
Champions
will work with the parish council and with other residents to drive up
the registered demand in their area. We are providing printed and
on-line materials and also supporting in many other ways. However, we
are a very small team so we do rely on Local Broadband Champions and on
communities themselves to help bring improved broadband to each area.
So is my area going to get broadband without me doing anything?
Clearly
the telecoms companies do have business development plans, but these
are subject to commercial confidence and they will only be required to
divulge these to us one we get into the actual procurement period (to
ensure that we don’t fund work that they were planning to do anyway). If
we are able to show high levels of demand in areas that these companies
were not planning to invest in, they can be influenced to bring forward
their plans or to develop into new areas so as to gain a competitive
advantage. Therefore it is in everybody’s interest to register through
our surveys, even if you think you ought to be getting broadband without
this project.
I want my business to provide goods or services to the project but my sector is not on the list on your website
That’s
not a problem. Simply complete the form in the usual manner and then
enter the heading under which your service should appear in the box
underneath the categories. Please try to keep this fairly generic so
that we don’t end up with 1001 categories with only one business under
each. If you make it too specialised the chances of a supplier using the
list are also reduced. http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/suppliers/supplier-registration/
What are the realistic chances of my area seeing any improvement in broadband speeds?
That is reliant on 3 factors:
1. We
can demonstrate demand in your area. For this we need as many completed
surveys from your area as possible - 100% response from an area with
100 properties is better than 10% from an area with 1000 properties
2. How
effective our procurement is – the whole country will be going out to
tender at pretty much the same time, so we need to prove a good business
case and that means showing potential suppliers that there is a demand
for the service and that we have reliable information about the current
provision
3. The
design of the network – this will depend on the levels of demand and
which technologies are used. We are stating that the solution should be
capable of upgrade to the 2020 EU targets of 100% coverage at
30Mbps and 50% subscriptions at 100 Mbps or more. Until we know how the
network will be designed to achieve these ambitions we cannot say
exactly what speeds any given area will achieve under the current
project. It should also be noted that because of the size of the
national roll-out new technology is emerging all the time, and so
limitations that existed just a few months ago may no longer be an
issue.
High impact, delays likely
