CLP: Broadband & Website

As with a lot of rural communities, Church Minshull suffers from slow Broadband Internet download and upload speeds. Although there were many questionnaire respondents stating satisfaction with their broadband speed, about 40% were not. During the open events further issues were raised about constraints of accessing High Definition pay on demand film and TV services (eg iPlayer, Netflix) and other media streaming services. In addition views were expressed that in the the longer term there will be more services available that need higher broadband speeds and in some cases services only requiring existing speed levels may cease to be available or increase in cost disproportionately. This will could deprive our community of these facilities.
Church Minshull also has a much higher proportion than the national average of both self employed – 17.6% (8.3%) and people who work from home – 34% (9.2%). Some of these people rely on good internet services to provide business or to be able to work and this was raised at the open meetings.
The open meetings also identified a desire to improve the village's website to make it a stronger community asset. The questionnaire responses indicated that only about 30% used it regularly for events and information.
The Parish Council, which is now responsible for the website, has been able to respond to the challenge as part of a communications stream of activity and with help of a National Lottery grant has launched Church MInshull's ARENA website with 8000 visitors in its first four months.
A small group has worked to ensure that Church Minshull is to be included in the infrastructure upgrade and that we do not miss out on the investment in Cheshire.
There are also plans to introduce an Internet Cafe and training support as part of new services at the Church Minshull Village Hall.

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