RELIEF may be in sight for rural residents and businesses who have been denied the benefits of a speedy broadband connection across the Cheshire countryside.
Rural firms in particular have been concerned they are losing out to urban rivals due to slow connection speeds.
But now the Country Land and Business Association (CLA) is launching a satellite broadband service to give those living out of town the ability to work online at high speed.
Kelsall webmaster John Hammond, of Elizabeth Close, runs the village’s website. He said: “I don’t get the speed that I am normally supposed to get. I am on an eight megabit-per-second service but at the moment it is only running at 1.96.
“If you are managing a website then it is not particularly good.
“People complain about it because they have signed up to a contract for a certain speed and they rarely get it.
“People’s attitudes to getting events on the web needs to change as well. Traditionally, people would use noticeboards in the village and the idea that there is perhaps a better way of doing it is alien to them.”
The CLA has slammed the Government for failing to provide fast connections and it has since teamed up with Eurosat to provide an annual broadband package for signed-up members.
CLA president Henry Aubrey Fletcher said: “This is a short-term solution to a long-term problem. Unless Government is prepared to invest in fast rural broadband, countryside businesses will continue to lose out to their urban rivals.”
Eddisbury MP Stephen O’Brien, who has an office in Tarporley, endorsed the initiative.
He said: “I have been contacted by a large number of people in our area – rural businesses and home-workers – who are thoroughly fed up because they are unable to access reliable broadband services which are sufficiently fast.”
