This is why the FSB decided to address the government and ask it
to extend its super speedy coverage plan from 90 per of rural
communities to 98 per cent by 2015.
The report, published by the FSB, also signalled that more than
a third (34 per cent) of rural firms did not
consider their ISP services reliable and a further 24 per cent
thought that they were not receiving value for their money.
The National Chairman of the FSB, John Walker,
issued a statement supporting the Missing Links report saying that
the location of a business should not matter and that every company
needed a good broadband connection in order to prosper:
"With the technology we have
today all firms should be able to trade overseas, throughout the
UK, and from town to village.
"With both rural and urban
businesses clearly looking to the internet to expand, it is
imperative the Government takes action to close the digital divide
between urban and rural businesses.
"We are calling on the
Government to rollout superfast broadband to rural areas by 2015.
The value of this is not in doubt."
The FSB saw superfast speeds as 20Mbps, which
is somewhat less than the Government's definition - 24Mbps and
above. It has been suggested that the body decided to go for this
figure to make its proposals easier to achieve.
