2001/0142

16 March 2001

 

 

This Press Notice is under embargo until 0:01 on Friday 16 March 2001

 

12,000 homes GET WIRED UP IN £10M PROGRAMME - WILLS

 

 DfEE Press Release - 16th March 2001

            Nearly 12,000 homes in six communities across England are to join one of the country’s largest pilot programmes to explore the effect computers have on people’s lives. Part of a £10m programme announced last April – called Wired up Communities – it will see computers installed in homes and schools in pockets of high social deprivation.

 

            Research shows that professionals were three times more likely to have logged on to the Internet than those from semi-skilled or unskilled family backgrounds (the DE social group). Wired up Communities will aim to bridge this digital divide between the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) haves and have nots by placing computers directly into people’s homes for good.

 

            Training and support will be offered to those receiving equipment, and a specially designed website will be set up to encourage participants to access learning and employment opportunities on the web. A range of technologies will be tested, including broadband and narrowband access, satellite communications and digital television.

 

            Schoolchildren in Wired up Communities areas will also benefit through the support of the national e-Learning Foundation, which will act as a catalyst in the development of local e-Learning Foundations to provide ICT devices for children to use in school and at home. This will take the computer : pupil ratios in these areas significantly higher than the National Grid for Learning targets (1:5 for secondary and 1:8 for primary by 2004).

 

            The six communities to receive a share of the Capital Modernisation Fund money are:

• The Carpenters Estate, Newham, East London: an inner city housing estate. All 750 households and the local primary school will be wired up;
• Framlingham, Suffolk: a rural area, centred on a market town, involving the more deprived areas that exist alongside pockets of affluence. 1,500 homes and the local school will be wired up;
• BeaconNet, East Manchester: an inner city housing estate where all 4,500 homes will be wired up along with local schools;
• Whitebirk Estate, Blackburn: an area in a town with inner city features. Over 2,500 homes will be wired up and five local schools will benefit;
• Alston, Cumbria: a rural area in which 1,200 homes across three small towns and isolated farms will be wired up. The project will involve two primary schools and a secondary school; and

·        Brampton upon Dearne, S Yorkshire: a former coalfield community. All 1,500 households in the community will be wired up and all 265 children at the local primary school will be provided with laptops.

 

These communities build on the success of the first pilot Wired up Community in

Kensington, Liverpool, which the Chancellor announced in October last year. Already people in over 400 households in Kensington are benefiting from the new technology, with a total of 2,000 PCs to be installed by early summer.

 

Learning and Technology Minister Michael Wills said:

 

“There is a gulf emerging between those who have access to new technologies and

those who do not – and it’s a gap that must be narrowed if we are to create a fair and prosperous society. We want to avoid the development of an ICT underclass and that is why we are piloting innovative ways of getting technology to the most deprived sectors of society.

 

“We know that only one in five members of the poorer, DE social groups have used the Internet compared with over two thirds of professionals – and this is a digital divide that must be overcome.”

 

            “The Wired up Communities initiative is getting computers right into 12,000 homes in some of the poorest estates and most isolated regions of the country. We are linking homes to schools so that the curriculum can be delivered online. Wired up Communities will test the part new technologies will play in driving up educational standards and increasing job opportunities. We plan to evaluate very closely the impact of the different mixes of technologies used in each community, and learn how best to bring about equality of opportunity through ICT.”

 

            Professor Henry J Beker, founder-Chairman of the e-Learning Foundation, said:

 

            “The Government’s generous £5m contribution to the national e-Learning Foundation will help put in place an infrastructure which could ensure that children in the Wired up Community areas and elsewhere can have access to technology which can greatly enhance their life chances and, in time, make a profound contribution to the national economy.”

 

NOTES TO EDITORS

 

This Press Notice applies to England.

 

1.                  The Wired up Communities was allocated £10m through the Capital Modernisation Fund in April 2000, to be spent by 2002. Capital expenditure is for infrastructure, either for hardware (eg PCs or set-top-boxes) or for connectivity (eg broadband cabling, satellite provision). Installation of equipment is expected to begin during the summer.

 

2.                  Further background on each of the Wired up Communities, including the Kensington pilot which is up and running, can be found in Annex A.

 

3.                  The ICT research referred to above can be found on: www.dfee.gov.uk/research/re_brief/RB252.doc

 

4.                  The national e-Learning Foundation is to receive £5m from the DfEE to assist in the provision of ICT for schoolchildren in Wired up Communities areas and ultimately through out the UK. The national e-Learning Foundation is a recently-formed charity which aims to promote the use of ICT in education and, specifically, to ensure that every pupil in the UK has an ICT device as a tool for learning and living. The provision of personal ICT devices will assist pupils in their studies and raise their levels of ICT literacy, enhance their personal job prospects and reduce skills shortages to benefit the UK economy, and place young people at the centre of developments to promote connected communities.

 

 

PRESS ENQUIRIES:	Janet Coull 020 7925 5261
PUBLIC ENQUIRIES:	0870 000 2288
NEWSDESK:	020 7925 6789 news.desk@dfee.gov.uk
OUT OF HOURS MEDIA CALLS:	07659 105 993
INTERNET ADDRESS :	www.dfee.gov.uk

 

 

 

ANNEX A

 

Details of each of the Wired up Communities :

 

1) The Carpenters Estate, Newham, East London – Contact Richard Stubbs (020 7366 6330)

 

• The London Borough of Newham (Carpenters Estate) is an inner city London borough with a culturally and ethnically diverse population. Ethnic minority groups make up almost 80% the total estate population.
• The estate is amongst the most socially deprived areas in the UK. The Carpenters Estate is in Stratford Ward which is ranked as number 206 in the Government’s overall Index of Multiple Deprivation, putting it amongst the 2.45% of most deprived wards in the country. Over 70% of Carpenters Estate council tenants are receiving housing benefit and nearly half of all tenants receive Income Support.
• Carpenters Primary School results at Key Stage 2 are lower than both the Newham and National averages. Disadvantage in performance at primary school level appears to follow through in a similar ratio to senior school. This is likely to affect further education and career prospects.
• The project will aim to wire up all 750 homes using set top boxes with ADSL and wireless links. Laptops and electronic whiteboards will be used in the local school. Content will be provided from a number of sources including the Newham Community Learning Grid, TAG Learning Ltd and Plato Learning Systems. DkTV(Different Kind of TV) and the Media Trust will both provide community TV content.

 

 

2) Framlingham, Suffolk – Contact Will Gibson or Peter Dodd (01473 242500)

 

·        Framlingham is a small market town north of Ipswich. Some 3,000 people live in the town and a further 7,000 in surrounding rural areas. Pockets of deprivation sit alongside much more affluent areas.

·        The Framlingham and District area meets the criteria for the Rural Development Programme and is accorded Rural Priority Area status. Framingham scores below average on the following indicators: percentage of female economic activity rate; households comprised of adults suffering long term illness; pensioners only and second homes.

·        The area also has: a low population density; poor external and internal communications; high dependency on agricultural employment; above average levels of long term unemployment and below average earning levels.

·        The project will test the use of new and recycled PCs, standard BT phone line/modem connections and wireless technology. It will aim to wire up about 50% of the 3,000 homes in the community.

·        This initiative will build upon the work already taking place in the schools. The school will help identify priority students and families, and these will include excluded and long-term sick students. The school intranet will be available to home based students for access to learning resources, email assignments, group work etc.

 

3) BeaconNet, East Manchester – Contact Steve Mather (0161 223 1155)

 

·        Manchester is the third most disadvantaged Local Authority area according to the DETR’s Index of Local Deprivation. The project will be focussed upon those parts of the Beswick/Clayton and Bradford wards in East Manchester which form the New Deal for Communities area. The area contains 4,500 households of which over 80% are houses and the majority of the remainder are low-rise flats.

·        The area suffers from a complex and inter-related range of issues including high crime levels, low educational attainment, poor health, high levels of unemployment, low levels of economic activity, a poor quality physical environment, low housing demand and a lack of local facilities. However, there still remains an active business and residential community who are committed to the long-term future of the area.

·        The project will aim to wire up all 4,500 homes in the community using a variety of technologies including new and re-cycled PCs, set top boxes, laptops and electronic whiteboards in schools.

·        Work is underway with Digital Brain to develop online content and provide teacher training for Internet publishing. The availability of home access to the Internet through BeaconNet will enable both pupils and parents to access the services and information from Education Action Zones and school websites, as well as enabling e-mail communication between parents and the school and vice versa.

 

4) Whitebirk Estate, Blackburn – Contact Derek Estill (01254 852 804)

 

·        Whitebirk is an inner city estate comprising three distinct housing areas, with approximately 2,800 houses: Whitebirk & Intack, Accrington Rd / Audley and Delph. Whitebirk is located between the boundaries of two wards, Greenbank and Shadsworth which are in the worst 10% wards within England and Wales for social deprivation.

·        Whitebirk has a lower economic activity rate (54.4%) than the national and Blackburn (59.2%) rate (1991). Also, Whitebirk's standard mortality rate for all diseases, respiratory disease and heart disease is much higher than national average.

·        The project will aim to wire up around 2,500 out of the 2,800 homes in the community. It plans to use PCs in the home and laptops in schools. Connectivity will be by cable

·        Negotiations between Digital Brain, a new concept in ICT resources and services, and the borough have resulted in the opening of a Northern office of the company on Greenbank Technology Park, Blackburn. The website offers pupils the opportunity to access on-line learning resources liked to the national curriculum, create their own files and websites and continue working on projects via their home internet connection.

 

5) Alston, Cumbria – Contact Daniel Heery (01768 242 130)

 

• Alston Moor is an isolated rural town located on the eastern edge of Cumbria, over 20 miles east of Penrith and 25 miles south west of Hexham. Its remoteness is a huge disadvantage when local people try to access local services like job centres and benefits advice. Local employment is predominantly in primary industries such as quarrying, mining and agriculture.
• Many people do not register as unemployed because it involves a 50 mile round bus trip. In the village of Nenthead, over 50% of the children rely on free school meals and there are numerous houses which do not have phone lines.
• The project will aim to wire up around 1,200 of the 1,300 homes in the community. It will test a range of different technologies including new PCs, satellite dishes, digital whiteboards, ADSL equipment, videoconferencing and laptops.
• The town’s secondary school has a new RM network and RM software (EasyLink). This will be complemented by a number of digital whiteboards to make lessons more attractive. They will use the network to develop links with pupils at home and with their parents so that pupils and parents can access the school intranet from home. Pupils will be able to access study materials and homework / revision materials and parents will have access to school policies and other related information.

 

6) Brampton upon Dearne, South Yorkshire – Contact Eileen Brooks (01709 822735)

 

• Once at the centre of the South Yorkshire coalfield and home to Cortonwood Colliery, Brampton is a former pit village with severe social, economic and cultural disadvantages. The local colliery closed in October, 1985 and the process of physical, economic and social regeneration has proved to be long and difficult. With significant Government and EU support since the late 1980s the former colliery sites and complexes at Cortonwood (Brampton) and nearby Manvers (Wath) have been transformed in what amounts to one of the largest urban regeneration projects in Europe.
• Brampton on Dearne is within Brampton, Melton and Wentworth electoral ward where unemployment is more than twice the UK rate, (8.2% compared to 3.7% as at January, 2001). Dependence on income support is high (34% of all households) and the proportion of dependent children in households on income support is particularly high (38.5%). Brampton also has a higher proportion of children living in non-earning households – 24% compared to 17% in UK. 41% of pupils at Cortonwood Infants School are on free school meals. Over 25% of the adult population has low numeracy and 20% have low levels of literacy.
• The project will aim to wire up all 1,500 homes in the community using Ondigital set top boxes. Granada Learning will provide six activities for each subject at Key Stage 2. They will also reformat a number of the Letts Education ‘ Revise GCSE in a week’ modules for use in the local comprehensive.

 

7) Kensington, Liverpool – Contact Robert Campbell (0771 498 1896 or 0151 260 1006)

 

• The Kensington Wired Up Communities project has already begun and was officially launched on 15 February by Steve Boyle, Chief Executive of Kensington Regeneration.
• The project is the first pilot scheme of its kind in the country and aims to provide up to 2,000 people from Kensington, Liverpool with a recycled PC, new printer and Microsoft software packages such as Windows 95 and Works Suite 2001.
• Kensington is a New Deal for Communities area and has well documented social, economic and environmental problems and a history of decline over the last twenty years.
• The project has over 1,700 names of residents from Kensington who have completed an application form. Over 400 computers have been installed since the installation programme commenced at the end of January, with the full 2,000 to be installed by the early summer.
• The project is currently funded by Kensington Regeneration and received £180,000 in 2000/01. This funding paid the running costs of the project and the

capital start-up for the new Cyber Training Centre, which is based at the project's premises and opens shortly.

 

WIRED UP COMMUNITIES

 

Press Notice Details:

 

Date of Publication:	16 March 2001	Press Notice ID:	2001/????
Important:	False	Time of Publication:	00:01
Region:	England	Action Sheet Completed:	False
Category:	Cross-cutting
Subjects:	DfEE announcements

 

Checklist:

 

Hard copies to Commons press gallery:	---	Fax:
Electronic release to COI:	Yes	Education correspondents, national print and broadcast:	Yes
Email:		Labour market correspondents, national print and broadcast:	---
Education correspondents:	Yes	IT correspondents:	Yes
Employment correspondents:	---	Lobby correspondents, national (G6):	Yes
IT correspondents:	Yes	Picture desks (G1):	---
Social Affairs correspondents:	Yes	No. 10 (10):	Yes
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Other:		FAS (11):	---
		Ofsted (14):	---
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		Welsh office (17):	---
		N. Ireland office (18):	---
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		Local Government Association (28):	---
		Labour Party Press Office:	---
		Women’s Magazines:	---
		Mr. Blunkett press:	---
		Mr Wills press:	---
		Mrs Hodge press:	---
		Ms Jowell:	---
		Ms Smith:	---
		Mr Wicks:	---
		Ms Morris:	---

 

Action Sheet

 

Title of Press Notice:	WIRED UP COMMUNITIES
Date of Issue:	16/03/2001	Draft for Minister:		09/03/2001
Draft cleared in Press Office by:	??
Special Advisor clearance by:	??
				&nbs