Rachael Hamilton MSP has expressed concern at the Scottish Government’s delay to their flagship R100 broadband programme.
Broadband Minister Paul Wheelhouse has admitted that contracts for the ‘Reaching 100’ (R100) programme won’t be signed off by the end of the year, in an answer to a parliamentary question.
The Reaching 100% Programme (" R100") is striving to extend the availability of NGA broadband infrastructure to meet the Scottish Government's commitment to deliver superfast broadband access to 100% of premises in Scotland by 2021.
In September last year, an Audit Scotland report concluded that it would be ‘difficult’ to deliver the R100 programme for every home and business to have access to speeds of 30mbps by the end of 2021.
The Borders has some of the worst broadband speeds in Scotland, which Ms Hamilton has repeatedly raised in Holyrood, calling on other solutions, such as community broadband in rural areas.
Ettrick, Roxburgh and Berwickshire MSP, Rachael Hamilton said:
“It is worrying that the programme to rollout broadband to 100 per cent of Scottish homes and premises has been delayed.
“People in the Borders know first-hand the problems of accessing fast and reliable broadband.
“Whilst it is an ambitious plan, the SNP have repeatedly confirmed that it is being delivered on time, clearly this is not the case.
“The SNP Government must explain how it intends to accelerate the programme in order to reach its target of 100% superfast coverage.
“Borderers will be disappointed that promises are clearly being broken”.