Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to the Digital communications infrastructure strategy, published on 18 March 2015, what estimate he has made of the cost of subsidising satellite broadband to a further one per cent of premises; how much of that cost will be borne by each of the superfast broadband programmes; when that scheme will be announced; and how that scheme will be publicised.

The Government anticipates that there will be around 300,000 premises with speeds below 2Mbps by December 2017. The cost of subsidising satellite broadband equipment is likely to be of the order of a few hundred pounds for each premises where consumers decide to take advantage of the offer. The superfast broadband projects have approximately £60 million funding reserved for supporting increases in speeds to 2Mbps. The scheme will be announced before the end of 2015 and it will be publicised by Broadband Delivery UK and by Local Bodies.