Allocate some extra rural broadband £250 million to final 5 percent

ENGLAND, UK: The MD of UK satellite Internet Service Provider Satellite Internet is calling local councils to spend some of the latest tranche of rural broadband funding from central government on delivering satellite broadband solutions to reach the final 5 percent.

It was announced that the extra £250 million allocated by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport be divided between local councils and each will have a month to decide how to spend it to ensure superfast broadband is available to the majority of homes.

"Whilst this is excellent news and will almost certainly be a boost for rural access across the UK, forgetting about the final five percent of the population entirely is a mistake," said Mike Locke, MD, Satellite Internet.

"To give some perspective, £250 million would cover a third of a million satellite installations, all equipment costs and a year's service at 20Mbps which could solve the issue as quickly as the dishes could be installed."

Satellite broadband can be deployed right now, cost effectively and providing consistent, reliable and fast download speeds. Satellite is already doing this for people throughout the country and so it is a known and realistic solution to just this problem.