Superfast broadband is on its way to Sutton next month. Connecting Cambridgeshire has announced that the first three fibre cabinets are due to go live on Friday 14th March with orders for upgrades being accepted later in the month. The remainder will follow by the end of the summer.

A government initiative to give Britain the best superfast broadband network in Europe was kicked off back in 2011. A Local Broadband Plan for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough was developed by the County Council and local councils and from this Connecting Cambridgeshire emerged. A call was made for people to volunteer as Broadband Champions with the aim to promote and encourage support for superfast broadband in their towns and villages. Mark Inskip and Lorna Dupré were amongst the local volunteers in Sutton.

Most major towns and cities already have superfast broadband but more rural areas have missed out. With the help of the Broadband Champions over 24,000 people across the more rural areas of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough signed up to show their support for superfast broadband. The Connecting Cambridgeshire project has amassed nearly £46 million of funding with the government funded BDUK allocating £6.75 million together with £23 million from local councils and £16 million from BT. This is enough to deliver fibre connected broadband to 98% of homes in the county with over 90% achieving 24Mbps broadband speeds by the end of 2015.