MS3 Networks has partnered with Lincolnshire Housing Partnership (LHP) to bring greater choice and affordability to over 450 residents in LHP’s low and medium-rise apartment blocks in Grimsby and Cleethorpes. This collaboration aims to connect these homes to MS3’s ultrafast network, significantly enhancing internet access for tenants.
Social housing tenants make up a third of the UK’s digitally excluded population, which hampers their access to education and job opportunities. Efforts to improve connectivity in these areas have often been slow due to the challenges telecom providers face in running cables through multi-storey buildings without causing too much disruption. Even when full fibre is available, many social housing tenants are limited to a single provider, leading to higher costs and less choice.
LHP aims to tackle this issue head-on by granting a master wayleave agreement to MS3, allowing the network operator to install its infrastructure in the housing provider’s properties across Grimsby and Cleethorpes. This expansion will increase the number of homes and businesses in Lincolnshire that can access MS3’s full fibre broadband to over 60,000, including a completed build in Scunthorpe covering 37,000 premises. The partnership follows MS3’s recent permission to install its network in low and mid-rise homes owned by Hull City Council.
Jo Fleming, corporate partnerships manager at MS3, highlighted the importance of this initiative: “Digital exclusion caused by a lack of fast and reliable broadband is a problem that particularly affects social housing residents. In North East Lincolnshire, around one in eight households live in socially rented housing, so our partnership with LHP allows us to improve socialisation, education, and job opportunities for residents.”
“But digital inclusion goes further than simply providing access to the infrastructure needed to get online; it’s about affordability. Thanks to our network of wholesale partners, residents will be able to choose a broadband option that suits their usage and budget needs, with an average annual saving of £200.”
Danny Wyer, Corporate Head of Property at LHP, added: “Our partnership with MS3 will help remove the barriers preventing our customers in Grimsby and Cleethorpes from using the internet and benefiting from the employment and education opportunities that connectivity offers. Three-quarters of our customers prefer accessing LHP services via their mobile phones or the website, so the installation of full fibre will also make it easier for them to communicate with us in this way.”
