Cllr Allan Walker has undertaken work on the delivery of the Superfast Broadband initiative within the Parish. 

His report can be accessed by clicking here.

 

A BT Superfast Broadband green 'supply box' has now been added and is operational at the entrance to Ashbury Drive. This means that many people on the Coggeshall Road estate and on the Coggeshall Road between the two mini roundabouts will be able to apply to their Internet Providers for upgrading to fibre option fast broadband (additional charges usually apply). The Parish Council have requested of Essex County Council that further parts of Marks Tey (those areas as indicated as 'A' in the above report) be included in Phase 2 of the programme.

 

Please click here for the latest programme update from the SuperFast Broadband team (updated Dec 2014)

 

The following up date was received on 3 May 2018 

Dear Essex Parish/Town Councils and Broadband Champions,

Superfast Essex, Essex County Council?s superfast broadband rollout programme, is writing to tell you about the outcome of an Assessment it has completed of the wireless broadband service provided by County Broadband.

The programme is writing to you because County Broadband has claimed to Superfast Essex that a wireless superfast broadband service is existing or planned in some or all of your community, so the outcome of this review impacts your community.

The outcome of the review is as follows:

  • The County Broadband network meets the technical requirements for superfast broadband as set by the EU and is capable of providing a superfast broadband service. Therefore areas covered by the service continue to be not eligible for public investment because a superfast broadband service is already available.
  • It is recognised that in a small number of cases the wireless signal in covered areas may not reach individual properties. Superfast Essex will maintain the already existing public feedback process for identifying these by using evidenced feedback from impacted residents or businesses. Where this process is successfully completed, the impacted premises will become eligible for public investment.
  • Superfast Essex will also continue to monitor very closely the deployment of the remaining ?planned? coverage by County Broadband to ensure this is completed within the notified timescales. If this does not happen, impacted areas will be reclassified as eligible for investment. Deployment of all planned County Broadband coverage must be complete by end of December 2019.

Under State Aid rules, Superfast Essex is legally unable to invest where a superfast broadband service is already available from a network operator. This includes the areas being claimed by County Broadband as confirmed by the review. Superfast Essex undertook this review in response to a high level of feedback from residents and businesses querying the quality and availability of the County Broadband service, particularly in areas where County Broadband is the only operator claiming superfast broadband connectivity and therefore the claim means Superfast Essex will not invest in improving the broadband network there. The Assessment was carried out by independent technical consultants in consultation with Superfast Essex and the UK National Competency Centre for State Aid (NCC).

The review was thorough and has investigated the issues raised by residents and businesses in detail. However, the investigation has upheld the original assessment that overall the County Broadband service meets the technical guidelines for a superfast broadband service. This is the final outcome which must be accepted.

As mentioned above, the public feedback process for County Broadband coverage areas will continue. If any resident or business at an address claimed to have an existing superfast broadband service from County Broadband, is unable to access superfast broadband via County Broadband and can provide evidence of this, Superfast Essex should be informed. We would prefer the evidence from County Broadband to be in writing (eg, an email), however if County Broadband is unable to provide written evidence then we will also accept evidence of a phone conversation or a site visit. We will need people to confirm the time and date of the phone call/visit and the name of the person who was spoken with/visited from County Broadband. We would encourage feedback to be sent in via our online contact form in the first instance: www.superfastessex.org/contactus, however we understand attachments cannot currently be added to this form, and will therefore accept any email attachments being submitted as evidence via this email address: make.theconnection@essex.gov.uk. In order for any feedback to be considered before the next phase of work is planned, please ensure you submit your evidence to Superfast Essex by 31st May 2018.

It should also be noted that options exist for communities to take local action to increase market competition for broadband services in their area if Superfast Essex investment is not available, and the government has some guidance options on its website regarding community-led schemes which may be of interest. The new Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme recently launched by UK Government also offers funding to businesses or business-led communities for the installation of a local full-fibre network.

The Superfast Essex interactive map is being updated to show County Broadband existing coverage as pink dots on the map to indicate a service is available and will continue to show County Broadband planned coverage as blue dots on the interactive map to show the coverage is under review until work is complete. The Superfast Essex interactive State Aid map will continue to class all County Broadband coverage as NGA Under Review ? and it will appear as yellow dots on this map ? while the coverage continues to be subject to the ongoing Monitoring Plan.

We hope this helps to clarify the current position. If you would like to contact the Superfast Essex programme, please do not hesitate to do so: www.superfastessex.org.contactus.

Kind regards

Superfast Essex Team

www.superfastessex.org
Contact Superfast Essex

 

31 May 2018 update 

https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/UKESSEX/bulletins/1f29728