|
LIVERPOOL
City COUNCIL SIGNS £15.9 MILLION CONTRACT TO BRING SUPERFAST
BROADBAND TO 43,000 MERSEYSIDE BUSINESSES AND HOMES
FIBRE broadband could be extended
to up to 98% of Merseyside businesses and homes within the next 3
years, following a multi-million pound partnership project between
Merseyside Local Authorities and BT.
Merseyside Connected; a partnership of 5 Councils led by
Liverpool City Council; builds on BT's on-going commercial fibre
deployment across the Liverpool City Region, and aims to provide a
high speed broadband network to an additional 43,000 premises in the
area. This means the vast majority of Merseyside; around 634,000
homes and businesses; could have access to fibre broadband by the
end of July 2016.
The Merseyside Connected project will also support the Council
partnership's aim to focus on enabling superfast broadband to small
and medium enterprises and help boost the local economy. The 3 year
deployment will begin with a period of planning and surveying,
before Openreach, BT's local network business, starts work on the
ground in summer 2014.
BT has been chosen to partner with Liverpool City Council; along
with Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton and Wirral Councils - following an
extensive and thorough procurement process. BT is contributing £6
million towards the overall cost of deployment in "non-commercial"
areas while European funding (ERDF) is contributing £4.4 million,
with £5.46 million coming from the Government's Broadband Delivery
UK (BDUK) fund.
Mayor of Liverpool and Chair of Liverpool City Region Cabinet, Joe
Anderson, said:- "The internet is a huge part of everyday life and
it is vital that we do not get left behind if we are to compete
effectively with the rest of the UK. This investment in
infrastructure will make a big difference to businesses and
households across the City Region. I am delighted we have been able
to sign this deal with BT which means they can crack on with
installing the latest technology."
Culture Minister Ed Vaizey said:- "This £15.9m project will
deliver an incredible transformation in broadband speeds for
thousands of homes and businesses across Merseyside. It will be
instrumental in driving growth, boosting the local economy, and
achieving the Government's objective of reaching 95% of all UK
premises by 2017."
Bill Murphy, managing director NGA for BT, added:- "Access to
high speed broadband is rapidly becoming a key ingredient for
economic growth and a fast and reliable broadband service is as
important as good road and rail links for businesses in the modern
day. It is also a major determining factor in where businesses
decide to locate. Fibre broadband opens up a whole raft of
leading-edge software and applications that could benefit business;
allowing them to work more efficiently, for people to work when and
where they want, to expand their business offering and connect with
customers, not just locally, but all over the world."
For local businesses, the fibre network will underpin the
introduction of many new services and applications. Big business
applications driven by new 'cloud' services will be within the reach
of enterprises of all sizes. Computer back up, storage and
processing will be faster, and the use of high-quality
videoconferencing will become a viable possibility.
Further benefits of faster broadband include users being able to use
multiple bandwidth-hungry applications at the same time, and send
and receive large amounts of data much more quickly and efficiently.
This will make things like gaming, watching BBC i-Player or
downloading films and music much quicker and without annoying
'buffering' or screen freeze.
New fibre services are set to transform the way consumers use the
internet, from the simple sharing of pictures and video to enjoying
the growing boom in entertainment services available online. It will
also open up a host of new learning and development opportunities.
Engineers for Openreach, BT's local network business, will build the
new fibre infrastructure. Fibre to the Cabinet will be the main
technology deployed. This can deliver wholesale downstream speeds of
up to 80Mbps, and upstream speeds of up to 20Mbps. Fibre to the
Premises technology; delivering ultra-fast wholesale speeds of up to
330Mbps – may become available in certain areas and may be available
on demand throughout the whole of the fibre footprint in due course
should local businesses want the ultra-fast speeds it offers*.
The new fibre network will be open to all communications providers
on an equivalent basis**. Households and businesses in Merseyside
will therefore benefit from a highly competitive market, bringing
greater choice and affordable prices from a wide range of service
providers. It will also boost the competitiveness of local
businesses, helping them to find new customers and operate more
efficiently, whilst opening up a host of new learning and
development opportunities for households.
Cllr Phil Davies, Merseyside Representative on the North West
European Regional Development Fund Local Management Committee said:-
"Superfast broadband will help local businesses improve performance
and create and safeguard jobs. It will provide a major boost to the
Merseyside economy and the North West European Regional Development
Fund programme is pleased to be supporting it financially."
Extra notes:-
*80Mbps and 330Mbps are wholesale speeds. Internet Service Providers
(ISPs) may use different speeds in their advertising. Individual
line speeds will depend on network infrastructure and the service
chosen by the ISP. Openreach has started to make FTTP on demand
available in its fibre footprint. Openreach will levy an
installation charge but it will be up to service providers to decide
whether they pass that onto businesses or consumers wishing to take
advantage of the product.
** Wholesale access means that BT must make its broadband
infrastructure available to Internet Service Providers to market a
range of competitive packages to customers. There are more than 80
service providers currently offering or using fibre services over
BT's network. Households and businesses in the project area will
therefore benefit from a highly competitive market, bringing greater
choice and affordable prices from a wide range of service
providers.. |
 |
ACTIVE KIDS
INVESTS £435,715 IN LIVERPOOL'S YOUNG STARS OF THE FUTURE
AS over 400 schools, groups
and clubs across Liverpool prepare to receive their deliveries of
new sport and leisure equipment from Active Kids, Sainsbury's has
announced that since the scheme began in 2005, a massive £435,715
worth of kit has been invested across the City.
Global superstar and Sainsbury's Active Kids ambassador, David
Beckham said:- "I'm passionate about inspiring kids to try a
new sport and that's exactly what Active Kids is all about -
encouraging kids to try, and hopefully really enjoy, something new.
Well done to all those schools, groups and clubs in Liverpool for
taking part this year and I hope they enjoy their new equipment."
It has been the region's primary
schools that have been leading the way in amassing Active Kids
vouchers with Great Crosby Primary School, one of Liverpool's top
collecting organisations, accumulating over 25,700 vouchers which is
being exchanged for equipment from the Active Kids catalogue this
week.
Pat Speed, head teacher at the Great Crosby Primary School said:-
"The Active Kids scheme is a great way to engage the teachers,
parents and extended family of our students to get behind a project
to support the school with vital sports and leisure equipment that
we would otherwise have to take out of our school budget. We have
been overwhelmed by the response and can't thank everyone, including
Sainsbury's, enough."
Pat continues:- "The scheme has helped us teach the benefits
of a healthier more active lifestyle to hundreds of children over
the last few years and we're really looking forward to getting
active with this year's equipment."
Sainsbury's customers across
Liverpool have collected vouchers in-store between 30 January and 22
May 2013, earning 1 voucher for every £10 spent.
The huge amount of equipment that has, and continues to be, invested
into Liverpool has made a real difference in supporting better
sports provision for young people across the City.
Councillor Stephen Munby, Liverpool's Cabinet Member for
Neighbourhoods, said:- "In Liverpool we have thousands of
world class sporting clubs, schools and schemes to get young and
enthusiastic sportspeople out and active. The support from great
projects like Sainsbury's Active Kids provides these organisations
with vital equipment to run coaching sessions and activities giving
everyone across the City opportunities to take part. We are so proud
that the region has reached this huge figure of investment from the
Active Kids scheme. It would be great for even more clubs and
schools across the region to get involved to continue this
investment in our future sporting talent."
The Sainsbury's scheme has seen a
surge in interest for sporting equipment and experiences following
last summer's Olympic Games with nearly 52,000 schools, clubs and
organisations across the country now benefiting from their
membership to Sainsbury's Active Kids.
This year alone, the scheme has delivered over £13 million worth of
equipment and experiences to schools, clubs and organisations, an
increase of £5 million on the previous year. A staggering £136
million worth of equipment and experiences has been donated to
schools, groups and clubs across the UK since it launched in 2005.
|
