The Quebec government has re-upped the money committed to their program to bring high-speed internet via Starlink to rural Quebec communities. In the third instalment of subsidies for the program, the Legault government topped up the reserve with another $26,270,376.
This builds on the $89 million and $21.6 million already invested last year, bringing the total amount of money invested into the Starlink subsidy program to $136 million. (via Nation World News)
The program provides Starlink kits free of charge and a monthly discount of $40 for three years. Users who would like to be involved in the program still need to pay for the delivery of the Starlink kit.
The idea is to connect all Quebec homes to high-speed internet. The plan continues for a terrestrial provider to provide wired connections to the 70,000 homes without high-speed availability. However, the cable providers have been slow, and thus the Quebec government has turned to Starlink for a short-term solution.
Per Gilles Belanger, Parliamentary Assistant to Legault, the program has been popular.
“We sold the first 15,000 kits very quickly. The demand is stronger than we thought,” he said.
The latest top-up will allow another 10,000 families to access high-speed internet through the program. There is no word on whether the government thinks there will be a fourth top-up soon. This program was created to help the government reach its goal of providing high-speed internet access to 250,000 homes by the end of its mandate. To meet the target, homes must have an internet connection speed of least 50 megabits per second (Mbps) download and 10 Mbps upload.
The government has sent letters to eligible Quebec households, but if you are outside the Hydro-Quebec network or operate a small SME, you fall outside the program’s scope.
