You only have until Friday 3rd June to respond to Wiltshire Council’s Broadband survey !

Digital Inclusion for Wiltshire

Wiltshire Council is investing in digital inclusion and access to super-fast broadband to support homes and business throughout the county.

Currently not all parts of Wiltshire have the same access to broadband. Around 5% of all households currently receive a poor service with very slow broadband speeds and over half of all premises are unlikely to receive superfast broadband by 2015. It means if nothing is done a significant number of residents and businesses will find it increasingly difficult to take advantage of the internet and the wide range of on-line services available.

Wiltshire Council has recognised the importance of broadband access and has decided to invest £16m in improving access to digital services in areas which would otherwise miss out. This investment along with government grant and additional investment from the telecoms industry will generate over £30m of funds. It is intended this will go a long way towards eliminating the so called ‘digital divide’ across communities. The council has set a target of 85% and possibly rising to 95% (pending government funding) of all premises to have superfast broadband availability by 2015.

Objectives

The digital inclusion project has three objectives which together form a strong basis to support a wide range of other initiatives especially in promoting economic growth, tackling social disadvantage, and in achieving a low carbon society.

They are:

1. To improve access to broadband for citizens and businesses in Wiltshire.

2. To increase the uptake and usage of council on-line services.

3. To ensure that everyone has the opportunity to become digitally literate and confident users of technology.

In order for the council to prioritize the roll out of superfast broadband throughout the county, residents and business users are being asked to participate in an online survey. It is therefore vitally important that Sherston and surrounding villages takes part in this survey to register as much interest as possible, to avoid being left out.

It takes 10 minutes of your time to fill in the survey – one per household / business address. The more responses , the better informed the council will be! The survey will run from 26 April to 3 June 2011. There are two surveys, one for residents and one for businesses, please select the appropriate link below. Thank you for your help.

Residents’ survey: http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/broadbandsurveyresidents.htm

Business survey: http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/businessbroadbandsurvey.htm

The survey is also available as a printed document and can be requested by calling telephone 0300 456 0100. A summary of the results will be placed on the website at the end of July 2011.

Further details see http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/communityandliving/digitalinclusion/

Email: digitalinclusion@wiltshire.gov.uk Tel: 01225 793349