BT have hit back at a statement made by Renfrewshire Council leader Mark Macmillan that it “doesn’t represent the facts” regarding broadband speeds and investment in Renfrewshire.
In a statement issued on Monday, Mr Macmillan said that local residents and businesses are missing out on the economic advantages of superfast broadband because of outdated 19th century copper wire technology in our telephone exchanges instead of 21st century fibre-optics.
Original Article: Renfrewshire Council Leader blasts BT over slow Wi-Fi
Councillor Macmillan said “The Scottish Government touts the many benefits of superfast broadband, especially for businesses. It’s quicker and easier to download files. It increases flexibility and mobility and provides round-the-clock, high-performance connections – except in Paisley.
“Here in Paisley we have 19th century copper wire technology in our telephone exchanges instead of 21st century fibre-optics. We have data transfer speeds that are 25 times slower than those available through superfast broadband.
“This is at a time when Renfrewshire Council is investing £1million in public Wi-Fi. Our aim is to ensure that residents, visitors, businesses and students have free, unlimited wireless internet access in Johnstone, Renfrew and Paisley.”
But BT doesn’t agree. A spokesperson from BT said “We’re concerned that Mr Macmillan’s statement doesn’t represent the facts about the state of broadband in Renfrewshire and that it doesn’t reflect what’s already available to homes and businesses in the area.
“Openreach, BT’s local network business, has invested more than £3bn in rolling out superfast broadband across the UK. This includes 40,000 premises in Renfrewshire in areas such as Paisley, Renfrew, Thornly Park and Johnstone. Independent data clearly shows that 91 per cent of UK premises have access to superfast speeds today.
“In fact, the independent website Think Broadband highlights that more than 93 per cent of Renfrewshire has access to superfast speeds of 24 Megabits per second (Mbps) or more. The UK’s Broadband Stakeholder Group have said that the average speed most households will require by 2023 is 19Mbps. These speeds, now available to many Scottish homes and businesses, will allow multiple streams of High Definition (HD) video content and fast file downloads, for example. Speeds of up to 80Mbps are now available across Renfrewshire. For businesses, BT also offers speeds of up to 10 Gigabits per second (Gbps) for data hungry businesses.
“Beyond our commercial coverage, as part of the Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband (DSSB) programme, BT is working with public sector partners to provider superfast fibre broadband to many areas of Scotland where commercial rollouts wouldn’t reach.
“Building on our commercial roll-out, we are on schedule to reach 95 per cent of Scottish premises by the end of March 2018. Many locations have benefited from extra coverage the Digital Scotland programme has brought, including Kilbarchan, Bridge of Weir and Erskine, with more deployment to follow. Further coverage from the Digital Scotland programme will be announced at scotlandsuperfast.com and local people can sign up for email alerts. New locations are announced every quarter by the programme.
“We’d encourage people across Renfrewshire to contact their Service Provider to benefit from the faster services now available to them.”