BT has announced a major expansion of high-speed fibre broadband in Scotland, which is expected to help create jobs and give a big boost to the local economy.

A further 291,000 homes and businesses across the country are to be included in BT’s £2.5 billion commercial roll-out of fibre broadband in the UK.

The total includes 25 new Scottish communities – such as Ellon, Forres, Blairgowrie, Lochgelly, Coatbridge and East Kilbride – which will be upgraded by the end of Spring 2014. A full list of the new locations is below.

The expansion also includes a substantial investment in making fibre broadband more widely available in areas which already have the high-speed technology or are due to receive it.

Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities, Nicola Sturgeon, said: "I very much welcome this latest announcement from BT. It is essential that households and businesses everywhere in Scotland have access to high-speed connectivity and fibre broadband will play a key role in enhancing our digital offering.

"The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that a world class digital infrastructure is in place across Scotland by 2020 and that a significant increase in coverage has been achieved by 2015. This investment, along with significant investment by the public sector, will ensure that this ambition is achieved."

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The announcement will take the total number of premises with access to fibre broadband in Scotland to around 1.45 million. Around half a million are already able to get the service – and BT is keen to bring more communities within reach by working with the public sector.

Brendan Dick, BT Scotland director, said: "This latest investment is a major vote of confidence in Scotland’s future success. It will be a key part of our economic revival as we finally shrug off the effects of the downturn and create a better, more prosperous future.

"Fast, sophisticated communications are the cornerstone of a successful community, helping local people to build their skills and knowledge and encouraging the creation of new businesses and jobs. This exciting technology will transform on-line education, training and leisure for households and enhance the competitiveness of local firms.

"BT has now announced plans to make fibre broadband available to around 1.45 million Scottish homes and businesses. Reaching that target will be a substantial achievement, but we want to go much further by working with partners to bring this exciting technology to more challenging areas."

BT’s local network business, Openreach, will be making fibre broadband available to two-thirds of UK homes and businesses by the end of Spring 2014. The roll-out uses a mix of fibre to the cabinet (FTTC) and fibre to the premises (FTTP) technologies. More than 13 million UK premises can already access fibre broadband and this figure is increasing by around 100,000 every week.

Both technologies offer speeds many times faster than the current UK average, reported by the regulator Ofcom to be 9Mbps. FTTC, where fibre is delivered to new street cabinets, offers download speeds of up to 80Mbps and upload speeds of up to 20Mbps1.

FTTP, where fibre runs all the way to homes and businesses, offers a variety of download speeds with the current top speed being 330Mbps1. From Spring 2013 BT aims to make speeds of 330Mbps2 available on demand in any area where FTTC has been deployed.

(GK/IT)