Northleigh village (Image: JONATHAN BUCKMASTER )
We’ve heard a lot of talk from Government about levelling up.
However, for some of our most rural communities, this simply has not materialised in relation to broadband.
Access to the internet is essential to our daily lives.
As an MP representing a very rural area of Devon, I understand how tiresome it can be to not be able to get decent broadband.
In villages across our countryside you’re lucky if you have one provider that is able to get you online.
For communities like Northleigh, a village of 120 homes, it was even worse.
They have been waiting since 2015 to see fibre broadband rolled out.
Part of this work began in 2019, but after just a quarter of the village was connected, everything ground to a halt.
There was a two-tier provision where part of the community could get online, but the rest could not.
When I was elected to Parliament in the summer of 2022, this was one of the first issues I sought to raise with those in positions of power.
For the past 18 months, I’ve been pushing for ministers to step up their game and get this problem sorted.
The village did secure funding through Project Gigabit, the Government’s scheme to help improve broadband connectivity for disconnected communities.
Yet it took almost two years for any sign of this funding delivering action on the ground.
In March, parish councillors and I met with a team from the Daily Express, to show them just how bad things were.
A local surgeon who lived in the village told me how he was unable to do his job properly because he could not download scans ahead of important operations.
In the wake of this visit, the Secretary of State professed her support for getting the village online, promising that the work would be done soon.
OpenReach was finally given the poke it needed, and the whole village was plugged in last week.
This is a big win for Northleigh.
However, it should not have to take almost a decade of fighting, and the intervention of an MP and a national newspaper, to force the Government to follow through on their promises.
Sadly, Northleigh is not an isolated case.
Ministers love to talk the talk, but now it’s time for them to also walk the walk and level up connectivity in countryside communities.
