A golden opportunity is being missed in not using the redundant Angle to Llandarcy pipeline as a conduit for broadband fibre optic cables, joint deputy leader John Allen-Mirehouse told today's (Monday's) cabinet.

"In this competitive world we can't afford to miss opportunities like that," he said.

This is one of the options which will be suggested to the Welsh Assembly Government when the county council makes strong representations for better progress on the roll out of the fibrespeed initiative.

BT are to be asked to clarify the extent of local 'not spots' as well as the number of line contractors and how their investment programme might help to address the county's business and wider community needs.

Representations are also to be made to OFCOM and relevant Government departments to allow mobile phone providers to allow automatic access to the strongest mobile signal to improve coverage in rural areas. The council will also ask OFCOM to review the Communications Act regarding BT's provision of copper cables to every new housing development in Wales instead of fibre optics.

Leader John Davies said it was very frustrating that the vital infrastructure was not in place to provide a satisfactory broadband service which had become part of people's lives.

He was also critical of BT's slowness in restoring rural telephone services when they went down. In his experience they could be out for two or three weeks, he said.

The Economy Overview and Scrutiny committee was congratulated on looking into the issue in depth and producing a 29-page report and recommendations.