AS residents across Thurrock have been bemoaning shortfalls in the region's broadband coverage – highlighted this week by the increased number of people working from home and students attempting to log on for schoolwork – Thurrock Council has spoken of its plans to ensure things improve in the future.

Many parents have aired their concerns over the slow speed of broadband in some areas of the borough and even a rudimentary investigation into local speeds shows Thurrock has been left behind in broadband speed tables.

Many parts of the borough have super slow broadband rather than super fast.

This is not just rural areas of Thurrock but also more built up areas like Grays and West Thurrock. Other areas of Essex which are more sparse in population have far better broadband than Thurrock has in its principal town.

To give an example businesses literally in the shadow of Proctor & Gamble cannot get above 10MBPS without getting into long term expensive contracts.

A local businessman said: "Years of under investment in putting fibre underground is really showing now with so many working from home but one light at the end of the tunnel may be the rollout of 5G which allows for much quicker broadband speeds, but this is very signal dependent and only available in certain parts of the borough."

That hopeful look at the future is mirrored by Thurrock Council leader Cllr Rob Gledhill.

Cllr Gledhill, who is also chairman of The Association of South Essex Local Authorities (ASELA), said: "ASELA is currently rolling out 130Km of full fibre infrastructure across Basildon, Brentwood, Castle Point, Rochford, and Thurrock, 60 kilometres (or just over 36 miles) within Thurrock - that's the equivalent of a cable running from Grays to the centre of London and back.

"This will initially connect around 130 public sector sites including schools, council care homes, libraries and fire stations, with the rollout scheduled to complete by the end of May enabling providers to deliver some of the fastest connections in the country to Thurrock and South Essex residents and businesses.

"ASELA has recently been awarded a grant of £2.5m from the government's "Getting Building" fund to further increase this fibre infrastructure rollout into more rural areas of the region, which should be completed in spring 2022. This is in addition to the £4.4m awarded to ASELA by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) in 2019.

"This fibre infrastructure will be a catalyst for private sector investment, significantly accelerating broadband connectivity providers' ability to deliver high speed internet access and engagement has started with potential providers as part of the ASELA Broadband infrastructure programme.

"It is expected that within 12 months there will be significant improvements in the availability of full fibre across the region and ASELA's evolving digital vision and strategy which complements Thurrock Council's own Digital Strategy has a clear focus to drive up full fibre coverage to near on 100 per cent, ahead of the government target of 2025.

"Thurrock also hopes to benefit from the new Towns Fund in Grays and Tilbury which could potentially receive up to £25million each to transform the towns including digital connectivity.

"Further updates about this exciting, cross boundary project will be shared in the coming weeks and months."

How do I test my internet speed on my computer?

Testing your internet speed via a computer couldn't be easier. Simply open the browser on your device and head to a speed testing service, speedtest.net for example. Other websites that offer a similar service include broadbandgenie.co.uk or broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk. There are also plenty of others to choose from.

Once you have done this, the site should present you with a 'begin test' button, so hit that, and your test will begin. The results of the test will give you your 'ping,' which tells you what your latency is, your download speed, and then finally your upload speed.

The upload and download speed will be displayed in Mbps (if you use speedtest.net – other speed testing websites may offer the information in a different format).

How do I test my internet speed on my mobile device?

The process for testing your internet speed on a mobile device is pretty much the same as it is on a computer. The only difference being that there are dedicated apps that you can use to access your broadband speed. Again, you can use Speedtest and its app, but there are lots of others available that allow you to test your internet speed.

Once the app has downloaded and installed itself on your mobile device, open it up and simply begin the test. It couldn't be much simpler, and you will see the results in the same format as you would by viewing them on your computer via a website, and you can still share the details of your test if you wish.

If your internet connection is woefully slow, you may have faulty hardware, so to rule that out you should contact your broadband provider for more information on how you can resolve the situation.