Project Gigabit

Project Gigabit is a £5 billion government infrastructure project to enable and deliver fast, reliable digital connectivity for the UK. The prime objective of the programme is to deliver gigabit broadband to those areas of the country that are commercially unviable for broadband infrastructure suppliers to build to without public funding.

Previous broadband infrastructure procurements were undertaken by Shropshire Council, but Building Digital UK (BDUK) is now responsible for procurements, contracts and supplier management, not Shropshire Council. BDUK is an executive agency, sponsored by the UK government’s Department for Science, Innovation & Technology. 

For project Gigabit updates, please visit the Gov.UK website.

The main Project Gigabit initiatives that impact Shropshire are: 

Procurements 

In July 2022 BDUK launched two procurements in Shropshire.  

Lot 25.01 Mid West Shropshire 

  • 6,089 premises (all in the Shropshire Council area) 
  • Subsidy available £12,030,000 (£1,976 per premise) 
  • This area is being reprocured, with an outcome expected Spring 2024

Lot 25.02 North Shropshire 

  • 12,277 premises (10,752 in the Shropshire Council area) 
  • Subsidy available £24,042,000 (£1,958 per premise) 
  • In May 2023, this contract was awarded to Freedom Fibre. Please email queries to Freedom Fibre at: careline@freedomfibre.com 

Elsewhere in Shropshire 

Remaining premises eligible for gigabit infrastructure subsidy will fall into a larger cross regional procurement framework. BDUK is expected to issue the invitation to tender in Spring 2024 

Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme 

For more information, please take a look at our voucher scheme page. 

'Very hard to reach' premises 

'Very hard to reach' (VHTR) premises are those unlikely to access a gigabit-capable broadband service via either Project Gigabit funding or commercial deployment due to their rurality and the cost/complexity of delivering a service. 

Published in April 2023, the government’s Wireless Infrastructure Strategy states that they will:

  • Launch an £8m fund to provide capital grants to further promote new satellite connectivity to the most remote 35,000 premises
  • Set out plans to encourage the provision of fixed wireless access to other hard to reach areas