The Chancellor introduced a National Infrastructure Strategy, in which it targets Gigabit broadband for 85% of UK premises by 2025.
An ambitious target ahead of the last election: Ahead of the General Election of December 2019, the Conservative Party set an ambitious connectivity target for the UK, initially for 100% coverage of full-fibre by 2025, later softened to gigabit-capable broadband for everyone by 2025. The Government made available £5bn to facilitate deployment in particularly hard to reach areas.
A further watering down of the target for 2025: On 25 November 2020, the Chancellor announced a new National Infrastructure Strategy, in which it was noted that availability of gigabit-capable broadband has improved significantly and is now available to 34% of UK premises. However, the 100% target for 2025 has now been revised down to 85% with a view to getting ‘as close to 100% as possible’ by this date.
A fraction of £5bn now available over the next four years: As part of the Government's spending review, the Government allocated only £1.2bn of the original £5bn to subsidise roll-out between 2021 and 2025. However, alongside these changes the Government did announce a £250m fund for the 5G Supply Chain Diversification Strategy, which will be published by the end of 2020.
