Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was in New Brunswick yesterday, and during his trip he announced a $475 million top-up to the Universal Broadband Fund. The top-up will help connect an additional 60,000 rural homes across Canada to help achieve the government’s goal of providing every community, in every province and territory, with high-speed Internet access.

To date, the Government of Canada has already announced that up to 900,000 more homes will have access to high-speed Internet, with more announcements to come, and the government is on track to meet its goal of providing access to high-speed Internet to 98 per cent of Canadians by 2026. Already, 93.5 per cent of Canadian homes today have access to high-speed Internet or are targeted to receive access through existing program commitments, compared to just 79 per cent in 2014.

To better support the people of New Brunswick, the Prime Minister also announced up to $17.6 million, on top of the previously announced $55 million in federal funding, to provide high-speed Internet access to a total of more than 27,000 homes in New Brunswick. This expansion is part of the government’s plan to ensure every home in New Brunswick has high-speed Internet access by 2030.