Friday, September 6th, 2019 (7:37 am) - Score 3,414

Police are investigating after around 2,200 premises in Cambourne were left without broadband ISP and phone access to Openreach’s (BT) national network following a major theft of the operator’s core copper cables, which is the latest in a spate of seemingly related “Metal Theft” incidents in Cambridgeshire.

By the looks of it the criminal scum, who clearly have no regard whatsoever for the significant impact they have on local residents and businesses, lifted the concrete lids on one of Openreach’s core copper access chambers before dragging 500 metres of weighty copper cables out of the ground and then cutting them.

A theft of this scale would seem to point the finger toward an organised gang, which may be targeting areas – usually rural ones – just outside of larger communities because it’s easier for them to go undetected and there are often fewer defences on the infrastructure to worry about.

Sadly there have now been several seemingly related incidents like this in Cambridgeshire and several have occurred within the past few weeks, including the one that we only reported on a few days ago (here). A related report on Cambridge News carries some pictures of the damaged infrastructure at the bottom.

A Spokesperson for Openreach said: “Our network has been damaged again in Cambridgeshire, which is really disappointing. Around 500 metres of our underground cable has been taken and we understand how frustrating this must be for people living there who are now without a telephone and broadband service. Our engineers are already working on the repair and we’ll get this done as quickly as possible. We’re working closely with Crimestoppers and ask people to be extra vigilant and report any suspicious activity to the police.”

Repairing this sort of damage is neither easy nor quick to resolve and requires a significant commitment of engineers, which will be taking resources away from other tasks like rolling out fibre optic broadband. Optical fibre isn’t worth anything to such thieves but copper currently carries a good price among dodgy scrap metal dealers.

Openreach has a partnership with Crimestoppers, which means they tend to offer a reward of up to £1,000 for information on these sorts of cable thefts (if it leads to the arrest and conviction of those responsible). If you have any information on this incident, please contact them on 0800 555 111 or use the online form – everyone stays 100% anonymous (information passed directly to the police will not qualify for a reward).

We should point out that people who commit this sort of crime don’t always get away with it and a fair few have already been put behind bars, although it’s difficult to get any up-to-date statistics as metal theft tends to cover a variety of different things.