Question reference: S5W-33217
- Asked by: Edward Mountain, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
- Date lodged: 12 November 2020
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Current status: Answered by Paul Wheelhouse on 3 December 2020
Question
To ask the Scottish Government, regarding Lot 1 of the R100 high-speed broadband programme, how many properties (a) are eligible and (b) have applied for each level of the Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme, and, in the event that applications are made to the Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme prior to its link-up with the UK Government’s Rural Gigabit Connectivity Programme, whether applicants can benefit from the top-up retrospectively.
Answer
At present, any premises in the North of Scotland (Lot 1) of our £600m R100 Superfast Broadband programme that are not able to access a superfast speed of 30 Megabits per second (Mbps) or above is eligible for a ‘main’ voucher – worth up to £5,000 – through the Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme (SBVS). As of 18 November 2020, the SBVS team has received 53 requests for vouchers in the Lot 1 area.
Suppliers have also now been made aware of the link-up we have secured between the UK Government’s Rural Gigabit Connectivity Programme vouchers (RGVS) and the SBVS vouchers since the launch of the SBVS on 14th September 2020, so there is no requirement for retrospective SBVS applications to be made. This enables these benefits from our £5,000 per premises voucher, under SBVS, to receive a top-up under RGVS of a further £3,500 for an SME business or £1,500 for a residential address.