Meeting documents

In April 2015 the Council had approved the establishment of the Aylesbury Vale Broadband Company and agreed for the Council to allocate up to £1.536m of the New Homes Bonus funding for the rollout of broadband in the Vale.  This included providing funding of up to £200,000 for a pilot project in the North Marston and Granborough area.

The Committee received a report updating Members on the Aylesbury Vale Broadband project and outline business plan.  Mr Andrew Mills, one of the directors of the AV Broadband Company also attended the meeting to provide a verbal update on progress and to answer questions from Members.

The Business Plan was attached as Appendix 1 in the confidential section of the Committee report.  Both the Business Plan and some information on the current position of the project contained commercially sensitive information as defined in Paragraph 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act, 1972.  Members referred to this information during their discussions.

Members were informed that information on the project progress that was able to be made publicly available could be accessed at www.avbroadband.co.uk.

The plans for the next areas for investment from the rest of the AVDC funds will be considered once the North Marston and Granborough network has been implemented and evaluated later in the year.  This will be done alongside the potential areas for future investment in relation to the next phase of the Connected Counties project.

Member requested further information and were informed as follows:-

(i)         that the work of the AV Broadband Company and the Connect Counties work would still not provide full high speed broadband coverage across the whole of the District.  As such, AVDC had been talking with BT on how matched funding might be used, from within the £1.536m agreed by Council, to reach even more villages across the Vale through the Superfast Extension Programme.  The LEP had identified a number of preference areas across the county where there was a high business/home working incidence and this included a number of areas in the Vale.  These villages included Ashendon, Aston Abbotts, Bishopstone, Calvert Green, Charndon, Drayton Parslow, Hardwick, Great Brickhill, Lillingstone Lovell, Newton Longville, Stewkley, Thornton, and Wingrave and Rowsham.  These areas had been identified as areas that had very poor or no broadband coverage, where a high level of demand had been expressed either through the previous Connected Counties scheme or the AVB project.

(ii)        that 48 Parishes had registered an interest in getting superfast broadband in their areas.

(iii)       that all of the homes in the pilot project area would be connected with fibre to the home, that would provide the best long term economic and social benefits.  It would also provide quicker upload speeds, something that was particularly important to local businesses.

(iv)       that, unfortunately, due to a number of issues a local cable laying team had had to be replaced with another team.

(v)       on a range of issues associated with the effective day-to-day running of the business, e.g. subscriptions management, staffing for the AVB company, customer support and service, and on how customer accounts would be managed.

(vi)       that AVB had been overwhelmed by the support it had received from community volunteers, which had both assisted in progressing the pilot project and minimising costs.

(vii)      on the work and business experience of Mr Mills.

(viii)     that AVDC had not considered working with other partners to establish the Aylesbury Vale Broadband Company.  A tendering process had not been necessary to select Mr Mills as the contracted amount was below the Council’s prescribed procurement limits.

(ix)       that the pilot project area had been chosen as Mr Mills had a good knowledge of that area.  The list for future projects had been put together with knowledge from known community demand, as well as where it was believed that there would be a good take up of the service.

(x)       that by becoming an NGA, AVB would be able to apply for matched funding for projects.

(xi)       that AVB were confident that there would be a good take up of broadband in the pilot project area.

(xii)      that the Council had taken legal advice to confirm that it was able to establish a limited liability company.

(xiii)     that AVB would be responsible for maintaining the fibre cable.

(xiv)     that AVB had a very good name in the local community and intended to comply with the Open Internet voluntary Code of Practice, and to deal promptly with any customer complaints.

(xv)     that once the broadband service was up and running, it was anticipated the first customers would go live in October 2015, AVB would be happy to report back to the committee with information on income breakdown and costs.

In agreeing that some parts of Appendix 2 needed to be updated, it was –

RESOLVED –

(1)       That the current position on the establishment of the Aylesbury Vale Broadband Company (AVB) and progress made to date in rolling out the programme in the Vale be noted.

(2)       That Members who had any further queries regarding AVB should send them to Officers, with replies then circulated to all Members of the Committee.

(3)       That further reports on AVB be provided to the scrutiny committee, after the first quarter of operations and after six months.