High speed broadband will not reach Bromyard (From Hereford Times)

High speed broadband will not reach Bromyard

A CAMPAIGN to bring high-speed broadband to Bromyard was left high-and-dry when a multi-million pound pilot scheme failed to include the town.

Residents living in south Herefordshire are expected to benefit from greatly-increased internet speeds after Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne announced four trials nationally would be spared the axe, during the comprehensive spending review.

But Bromyard and other towns and villages in the north of the county will be forced to muddle on with low speeds after being left out of the scheme.

Town mayor Jamie Jacobsen said: “To hear it’s coming to Herefordshire but just missing us is quite frustrating.

“As well as high-speed internet we want to see what we can do to bring even ordinary speed internet to some of the hinterlands. We have a lot of businesses who rely on internet access.”

Coun Jacobsen added that he thought the parish would have been “perfect” for the pilot scheme.

Herefordshire ward councillor for Bromyard, Alan Seldon, has been a vocal proponent of the broadband campaign.

“I wrote to Bill Wiggin [MP] and said isn’t Bromyard an ideal place to run this pilot,” he said. “It’s really very frustrating.”

For the past few months coun Seldon has been urging townspeople to add their votes on a BT website for the chance to ‘fast-track’ the roll-out of superfast fibre-optic broadband in Bromyard. However, so far only 86 people have opted to do so.

Coun Seldon said: “There seems to be a bit of apathy from people out there as well.”

He urged internet users to log on to racetoinfinity.bt.com and enter their postcodes to register an interest.