A NEW community-led project has been set up in Clapham to bring future-proof broadband to every home.

Clapham Hyperfast was launched at the public meeting in the village hall last Wednesday, attended by about 100 residents.

The audience heard that, at the moment, most homes in the village were too far away to get superfast broadband from existing providers, but speeds, hundreds of times better than at present, could be achieved by connecting to Broadband for the Rural North, the Lancaster based, not-for-profit, community organisation.

Better known as B4RN, the network is gaining national recognition for bringing Hyperfast, one gigabit speed broadband to rural communities without the need for public subsidy.

The meeting saw lively questioning of the Clapham Hyperfast team and more than 40 volunteers stepped forward to help with the project. Help is needed to lay ducting across farmland, blow fibre through the ducts and make connections to people's properties.

Project members explained that the community must finance and build the broadband network. A funding target of £75,000 has been set and, since the meeting, a number of substantial offers of investment has been made.

It is hoped that sufficient funding will be in place before Christmas so that the digging of ducting for the network can begin as soon as the weather allows.

For more information or an investors pack, email info@claphamhyperfast.net.