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£9.5 million Government fund created to get people online

ended 13. August 2025

Local charities and councils could benefit from £9.5 million in new UK government funding to turbo-charge grassroots efforts to help the 1.6 million people in the UK who can’t access the online world. The money, the government announced, will support the best and smartest ways of tackling digital exclusion, which could include putting on workshops to familiarise people with tech, schemes donating devices like phones and laptops to the digitally excluded, all led by local councils, charities and other bodies working in the heart of their communities. 

Digital exclusion, the government says, is holding too many people back and tackling it is critical to driving growth, which is at the heart of the government’s Plan for Change. Research suggests that 7.9 million adults across the UK lack basic digital skills, while 1.6 million people live offline altogether. These are people who are locked out from some of the basic opportunities that modern life offers, whether that’s mastering the essential digital skills for work – like setting up an email account and sharing files – or facing higher costs for things like home insurance, train travel and food – with people paying up to 25% more than consumers who are online. 

UK Telecoms Minister Sir Chris Bryant said: "It is unacceptable that in 2025, millions of people across the UK simply can’t access the vast opportunities that technology and the online world offers. Digital inclusion is an essential for modern life and work, not just something that’s nice to have, and it forms a critical part of our Plan for Change.

“Making technology widely accessible could be the thing that means a sick patient can speak to a GP remotely, or that helps a young person successfully apply for a job. Through this funding we’re moving further to empower local leaders and groups nationwide, who are already working tirelessly to get their communities connected and change countless lives for the better.”

Any thoughts, send them across as this story broke overnight.

2 responses from the Newspage community

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Editor
Scott Gallacher
Director at Rowley Turton
While digital exclusion is a real issue, I question some of these numbers — many of the 1.6m “offline” will have family or friends helping them out, just as my in-laws did. More importantly, with a £41bn black hole in the public finances, is this really the best use of taxpayer money? A smarter approach would be to mandate that the tech giants and social media platforms fund it as part of their corporate responsibility. Let's face it, they'd benefit most from an extra 1.6m users.

And £9.5m split across 1.6m people is less than £6 each — hardly enough to close the gap. This feels more like a headline grab than a real solution.
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Editor
Kate Allen
Owner at Finest Stays
Getting the offline crowd online is a no-brainer for opportunities across so many facets of life. The real challenge is curating what they find there. As any tech user knows, the internet’s a goldmine, but it’s also a minefield of screen addiction and bad actors.