Uplands to get £20m boost for broadband

The Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) yesterday published its long-awaited uplands policy review, announcing measures to ensure all hill farmers benefit from environmental stewardship subsidies and a pledge to reduce red tape as well as improve internet access for many rural communities.

But countryside groups expressed strong disappointment the review did not go further and establish a new national strategy for the uplands, with targeted support for struggling areas.

The Commission for Rural Communities (CRC) and the Country Land and Business Association (CLA) were both also critical of the failure to outline a clear economic role for national parks.

But the announcement of a new £20m Rural Community Broadband Fund was universally welcomed, with residents in all rural areas able to bid for backing for small-scale projects to bring broadband to their communities.

Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt said: “This new fund will enable some of the most remote communities in England to bring broadband to their homes and businesses. Rural areas have the most to gain from access to broadband, but these are the communities currently missing out.”

Lack of access to the broadband speeds taken for granted in most urban areas has long been a bugbear for many residents and businesses in rural areas. Last month North Yorkshire County Council launched a campaign to bring high-quality broadband connections to all premises in the county by 2015.

Further details of how communities can bid for money from the new fund will be published later this year.

Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman said the broadband programme was just one of the ways the Government intends to help upland farmers in the future.

Other measures announced yesterday included a guarantee that all hill farmers eligible to enter Uplands Entry Level Stewardship – the Government’s key environmental management scheme for hill farmers – will be able to do so, which Mrs Spelman said would be worth up to an extra £6m a year.

She also revealed plans to create an “upland theme” within the Rural Development Programme to better target support towards hill farmers, and pledged to reduce red tape on issues such as livestock movement, abattoir regulation and farm inspections.

“England’s upland communities face difficult challenges, yet these are places with a remarkable range of human and natural assets and they can have a bright future,” she said.

“I am determined these areas will not be overlooked. The range of measures announced today will help hill farmers become more competitive and take advantage of new opportunities to grow their businesses. They will also help rural communities to thrive.”

But while many of the individual measures were welcomed by countryside groups, the lack of an over-arching new strategy for the uplands at Whitehall was greeted with widespread disappointment.

CLA president and Yorkshire landowner William Worsley complained that requests for the establishment of a Minister with direct responsibility for the uplands, and an independent monitoring group to oversee policy delivery, had both been ignored. “Defra has failed to recognise the uplands are different from other rural areas and need targeted support,” he said.

Mr Worsley described the £20m rural broadband fund as “good news”, but said the review contained no measures to ease planning policy to allow diversification in upland areas, and ignored his body’s suggestion of having retirement homes on uplands farms.

The Commission for Rural Communities, which published its own report on the future of upland communities last year, said it was “encouraged” Defra was now showing greater commitment to hill-farming communities.

But a spokesman said: “It is disappointing that a number of our recommendations have not been taken up. Specific measures announced by Defra are welcomed, but we are concerned the report does not address our call for a national strategy for the uplands to maximise the unique and diverse assets they provide.”