(2 days, 5 hours ago)
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Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
I beg to move,
That this House calls on the Government and service providers to help improve mobile connectivity in rural areas.
I start by thanking the Backbench Business Committee for granting time to hold this vital debate and for granting us a second opportunity to do so, as the debate had to be postponed earlier this year because of overrunning Government business. I declare my interest as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on digital communities.
As MP and resident of one of the most rural constituencies in England, I know from first-hand experience how frustrating it is to try to call the office or family members from a mobile phone. Whether at home, travelling around by car, out in the countryside or—more rarely, I have to say—travelling by train or bus, there is always a significant chance that we will not be able to make a phone call or connect to the internet.
This has a very real impact on my constituents’ lives. Stories of people being forced to sit in the loft or stand in the one spot in the garden with signal, regardless of the weather, would sometimes verge on comical if they were not so serious. For constituents waiting for their GP to call or for their disabled daughter to say they have made it to work okay, or for constituents in their 90s who have been left without power or heating, this situation is not funny at all. In the words of Terence, a disabled 80-year-old veteran:
“What is really annoying is that I am paying the same amount for my unreliable mobile service that someone in an area with good mobile signal pays.”
This week, I asked people to share their mobile signal experience with a single Facebook post. Within a day, 400 people had commented to share how awful it is in their area; whether they were in St Martins or Selattyn, in Welshampton or Woore, it was the same incredibly frustrating story. As one constituent said:
“Finding 4G is like striking gold.”
It is not just North Shropshire where reliable signal is such a rare commodity; it is the same in rural areas up and down the country. Elderly residents in sheltered accommodation are forced into digital isolation, out of contact with their families. Others have forked out for the privilege of playing provider bingo. As another constituent told me:
“Our adult daughter has a disability and learning issues, so having a good signal is imperative to us. Because of this, all three of us are on different networks (EE, O2 and Vodafone) so that we can ‘work the system’ and find the best signal available, at additional cost to us.”
That might have been acceptable 20 years ago, when mobile phones were a novel piece of technology and people could rely on letters and landlines, but in 2026, when landlines have been switched to digital and Royal Mail reaches the house once a week or even once a fortnight, it is simply not good enough. Mobile phones are an essential part of daily life, yet huge swathes of the country are being forced to cope with a substandard service. People have to put up with not just awful coverage but being gaslighted by companies telling them that their signal is just fine.
One of the biggest issues that comes up time and again, in my work as both MP for North Shropshire and chair of the all-party parliamentary group on digital communities, is the mapping data provided by the industry to Ofcom, which is often false. In July, the River Severn Partnership advanced wireless innovation region, which is funded by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, conducted the UK’s largest independent survey of mobile coverage in partnership with Streetwave, supported by over 30 councils through the use of their bin lorry routes. The report confirmed a significant difference between Ofcom’s view of mobile network capability and the real-world experience endured by those of us in rural areas.
Ofcom stated that 1.45% of geographical areas were considered areas without “good” voice capability from at least one of the four network operators, while the River Severn Partnership showed that it was 15.33% of postcodes. That is a huge difference.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)
I am grateful to the hon. Lady, a fellow Shropshire MP, for giving way. Part of my constituency used to be her constituency, and she will know that there are lots of small rural businesses that rely on connectivity, not just broadband but cellular connectivity and being able to take and make telephone calls. Will the hon. Lady join me in calling on the Minister—as I previously have done—to ensure that Ofcom requires greater transparency and integrity in the data that the mobile companies are providing to all our constituents and, more importantly, that Ofcom is more robust and takes action when it thinks that the data is not as accurate as it could be?
Helen Morgan
The right hon. Gentleman, my constituency neighbour, makes an extremely good point. The quality of the data is critical. One of the recommendations of the APPG is exactly that: to ensure that data is reliable and that Ofcom can challenge it where they know that it is inadequate.
There is a huge difference in which areas are considered to be without “good” voice capability. Ofcom disputes Streetwave’s findings because of the methodology that it used, but the experience of those of us who live in rural areas suggests that it is Ofcom that is wrong. It is no good telling people that their service is good when their own phone is telling them that it not. Unless Ofcom establishes clear requirements to define the quality of service that networks must deliver, how can we ensure real regulatory accountability?
Put simply, Ofcom and the Government must do more. I welcome the Government’s recognition of the need to improve coverage reporting in the statement of strategic priorities that it published yesterday, but at the moment we do not have the information that we need.
I do not know about you, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I think people in rural areas are sick to death of being told to believe that they have never had it so good, discounting their own daily experience. Last year, Ofcom increased the accuracy of its mapping data by zoning in on smaller areas. However, if network operators do not have accurate data about the areas that need improvement —and we think that they do not—then investment is unlikely to be put into the areas of greatest need.
The shared rural network initiative, which has delivered, I have to say, no noticeable improvement in my area, involved the then four mobile network operators spending half a billion of their money to end partial notspots, based on the Ofcom data that has now been superseded and that we all suspect is a bit on the dodgy side.
EE—the same company as BT and Openreach—already had an extensive network of mobile masts, and it met its obligations in advance of the June 2024 deadline for the shared rural network, while other operators experienced delays. Some of the causes of delays are difficult to overcome. It is difficult to get planning permission for a new mast; there is a lack of planning resource in local authorities; there are logistical challenges to building masts in remote and rural areas; and there are issues over access to land.
Another part of the problem was that EE did not share access to its masts, because it failed to reach agreement with the other mobile network operators. That was a commercial negotiation into which I do not have insight, but the reality is that better coverage could have been achieved simply through effective equipment sharing. My Bill, the Access to Telecommunications Networks Bill, sought to fix the problem by requiring telecommunications companies to share their equipment; penalising them if they did not; and, in areas where they did not, requiring people to be enabled to roam between networks. We are all familiar with that issue if we have travelled in Europe.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)
It would be wrong to let this moment pass without reflecting on the fact that EE has its network of masts as a result of significant public investment, because it got the contract for the emergency services network. Does that not impose a duty on it to do more than merely commercial negotiation in relation to other companies?
Helen Morgan
My right hon. Friend makes a good point about the use of public money and how we develop infrastructure fit for the modern age as part of a public and private operation.
Rural roaming measures have been opposed by the industry, but they were recommended by the Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in its 2019 report. I am convinced that if the Government are serious about enabling economic growth in rural areas, they should explore that option. My constituent Rob Paul, a consultant with vast experience of rural telecoms projects, suggests that robustly enforced financial penalties are the only thing that operators will respond to. After years of being let down, I cannot disagree.
I turn to the digital switchover. Mobile phones have been cited as the default back-up option in a power cut once the copper landline network is switched off, as has now happened over most of the UK. That is hugely concerning for people in areas prone to extensive power cuts in winter storms. As we are rural, our power is not put back online as a priority. Back-up batteries for routers will last for a couple of hours—perhaps up to 12. People in remote parts of North Shropshire are sometimes left without power for several days. Someone who is at home on their own, in the dark and frightened, might want to call someone other than the emergency services in the event of a power cut. It is crucial that people can access their mobile phone and get a reliable signal when the power is down, whoever they are.
One 90-year-old constituent told me that she purchased a phone because she was concerned about the digital switchover and wanted to ensure that she could still make calls in the event of a power cut. The mobile connection in her village of Knockin is so bad that she was never once able to use the phone. When she asked EE to end the contract, it required £293 to release her.
It is not just about power cuts. Hundreds of people in Kinnerley and Ellesmere have been left without any service at all when their broadband cabinet has been taken out by other factors such as fire or car accidents. Peter, who lives near Whittington, has terminal lung disease. Last weekend, his internet went down for 12 hours, which also meant that his landline was down. There was no mobile signal at his home. If Peter had had an emergency, he would have had no one to turn to.
Improving rural phone signal would not just help vulnerable individuals. It would help local businesses, grow the economy and help our health and social care system. Smartphones are an essential part of daily modern life, whether that is for a GP patient who needs to book an appointment or request a repeat prescription or for a small business owner who needs to take payment from a customer. I have spoken to countless elderly people who struggle to access key services. I have heard from farmers, landscape gardeners, taxi drivers and dog groomers whose businesses all suffer because of signal problems. One livestock and arable farmer told me:
“I cannot express strongly enough how frustrating it is farming in the modern world. It is depressing the amount of time wasted walking around the yard trying to get a slight signal to answer the phone”.
Someone who gets injured may have no way of contacting the emergency services or seeking other help. Vast sums have to be spent on helping tractor GPS systems to navigate the inconsistent signal.
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this important debate. I represent a rural area like hers—mine is in Lincolnshire—and in some Wold villages it is appalling: there is no mobile connection. All the red telephone boxes are being closed, and it is a tremendous struggle to persuade BT to keep them open. I wonder whether we could do more work with councils such as West Lindsey on the voucher scheme and Project Gigabit to get to the last hard-to-reach areas. Through this debate, can we encourage the Government to put resources into helping district councils such as West Lindsey?
Helen Morgan
The right hon. Gentleman makes a good point. I will mention Project Gigabit and its shortcomings, but we could have a three-hour debate on the subject. I wholly agree that we cannot consider mobile coverage and broadband separately. They are two parts of the same thing: the areas with the worst broadband signal tend to have the worst mobile signal. It is a very difficult problem to resolve.
As I was saying, modern farming requires modern technology, but if the signal is inadequate it does not work. Being able to rely on broadband would also help those who work in an office, but just 50% of rural commercial buildings in North Shropshire have access to full fibre. The announcement of Project Gigabit gave us real hope, but after two years, the contract was handed back having connected just 3,500 of the planned 12,000 properties. The word I would use to describe Project Gigabit is “shambles”, as my adjectives of choice are unsuitable for the Chamber. We are still waiting for details of when the rest of the properties will be delivered, but meanwhile we continue to pay exorbitant prices for mediocre broadband because Openreach and other companies neglect to invest in our area. Across the House, Members are calling for a change in direction for rural digital infrastructure.
I am conscious of time so I will speed up slightly. Essentially, gaps in mobile and broadband coverage threaten to undermine national ambitions. My report from the APPG on digital communities highlights how co-ordinated action to address the challenges and unlock the full potential of the UK’s digital infrastructure is crucial for rural areas and for growth in the rest of the UK as well. Successive Governments have failed to grasp that. We can just look at the emergency services network, which should have been introduced in 2017. Nearly a decade on, we are still waiting for it to be properly rolled out.
The Government’s ambition is to have high-quality 5G in all populated areas by 2030, yet we rank 30th among 39 developed economies according to the Social Market Foundation. We know that we are lagging miles behind and we are still trying to make up the ground. In Shropshire, we would be grateful for consistent 4G. People who live in rural areas pay the same, or even higher, fees as people in towns in return for a second-rate service. We must be given the connections that we need to reliably access modern life.
Successive Governments have treated rural areas with disdain, telling us that everything is great when we can see for ourselves that it is not. It would bring far more money into the Treasury and unlock the huge potential of the rural economy if the Government finally saw sense. I hope that the Minister will address the abject failure of the shared rural network and Gigabit projects, and outline a sensible strategy for delivering rural infrastructure in future.
Several hon. Members rose—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)
If Members can limit their remarks to around five minutes, we should be able to get everybody in.
Leigh Ingham (Stafford) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) for bringing forward this important debate. Mobile connectivity remains a real concern for many in rural communities, especially in my constituency of Stafford, Eccleshall and the villages. It affects how people run their businesses, how they keep in touch with family and how they keep safe, as the hon. Lady said, particularly on isolated roads and farms.
I will begin by acknowledging the great progress that has already been made in this area. My experience of the shared rural network and its extended coverage to around 280,000 homes and businesses after £500 million of investment has been positive. I recognise the importance of that investment in the difference that it has made to Staffordshire.
My constituency is about 40% rural, with 60% of people living in towns, and there is such a marked difference in the experience of connectivity. The gap is still quite stark: nearly half of rural deprived areas are not classed as 5G hotspots, compared with just 2.7% of urban deprived communities. In rural areas, only 20% of mobile masts have 5G deployed, compared with 48% in urban areas. Those figures show that although coverage may look strong on national averages, rural communities are feeling the gap and feeling left behind.
The issue is raised with me and my team regularly. Residents in Mare, Whitmore and Acton have all contacted me about unreliable mobile access, which leads to dropped calls, weak indoor signal and stretches of road with no coverage at all. That is just part of their daily lives when living in rural areas.
Sarah Edwards (Tamworth) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Similarly, in my constituency, I surveyed residents in a number of villages such as Edingale, Clifton Campville and Harlaston to ask how bad the situation was. Some 49% said that their mobile connectivity was so bad that they could not work from home or even run their business. Does she agree that this really has to be a priority so that our villages are not left behind?
Leigh Ingham
I thank my hon. Friend. As fellow Staffordshire MPs, we experience broadly similar issues, and that echoes exactly what many people in my constituency have told me, particularly about working from home.
For farming businesses in particular, of which I have many in my constituency, the impact is even more clear. The National Farmers Union’s most recent survey found that only 22% of respondents report reliable mobile signal across their entire farm, and nearly one in 10 have no 4G or 5G access at all. At the same time, 98% said that mobile signal is important to their business. Here in this House, we regularly ask farmers to access schemes online, communicate digitally with our agencies and adopt new technology, yet many operate with poor or patchy connectivity. The gap between need and access is stark.
In the village of Church Eaton, residents endured years of very poor mobile coverage, at times unable to make 999 calls or receive NHS alerts, despite a mast having already been built under the shared rural network. The infrastructure was there, but it had not been switched on, which left the village in limbo and left residents—let’s be honest—really annoyed. Working closely with the determined residents—I pay tribute to them and the parish council that has campaigned on this for many years—I raised the issue in Parliament and VodafoneThree’s leadership got in contact directly to help get that site back into the company’s investment plan. I am pleased that following that joint effort and constructive engagement, the mast has been running since September, bringing reliable 4G coverage to the village for the first time, but it should not take an MP standing here for that to happen. The infrastructure was already there; the village was not waiting for it. The mast has meant stronger coverage not only for VodafoneThree customers in the village, but for customers of a wide variety of signal providers.
I want to place on the record my thanks again to the parish councils across my constituency that have worked on this issue for years. They regularly gather evidence, engage with providers and keep the issue alive. Their persistence is invaluable in making progress in this space, because as more and more public services move online, access to stable mobile and broadband connectivity become even more important.
Rural communities should not be left waiting while national averages improve on paper. We need faster delivery of the shared rural network to eliminate the total notspots, alongside support for a mix of technologies to reach hard-to-access areas. Most importantly, rural communities must have confidence that they are not an afterthought in any roll-out plans. People living in villages, on farms and down country lanes deserve the same reliable connectivity as anyone else, and closing that gap is essential for fairness and productivity, and also to increasing opportunity in rural Britain. We have some wonderful businesses and local farms that want to develop, but a lack of connectivity can hold them back. I would love to hear what steps the Minister is taking to advance mobile connectivity and involve rural communities moving forward.
Neil O’Brien (Harborough, Oadby and Wigston) (Con)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. For the last 18 months, the Government have been sitting on the guidance relating to gender-questioning children in schools—a very controversial subject—which the Government keep saying is coming. It has become apparent in the last half an hour that they plan to publish this guidance at 4 pm today, just moments before the House goes into recess for a week. It is hard to see this as anything other than a deliberate attempt to avoid the scrutiny of this House on an important issue. What can we do to put this right?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his point of order. As he will be aware, it is up to the Government as to whether they want to make a statement, but I will ensure that Mr Speaker is aware.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) on securing this important debate. My speech about mobile connectivity in my constituency in the Scottish Borders will echo many of the remarks that the hon. Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham) has just made—I suspect we will get a lot of consistency across the House.
In an age when digital access is a necessity, too many rural communities remain cut off, not only by geography, but by inadequate infrastructure and poor decisions by mobile phone providers. We often speak in this place of levelling up and ensuring that no part of our country is left behind. Yet for many of my constituents in the Scottish Borders, making a reliable phone call, sending a text or accessing mobile data is still a daily challenge. In some area residents must stand in a particular spot or drive up a hill just to get a signal. That is simply not acceptable in 2026.
Connectivity is about far more than convenience; it is about safety, economic resilience and tackling rural isolation. Farmers operating machinery, elderly residents living alone, small businesses processing payments and families keeping in touch all depend on reliable phone networks. When that signal fails, the consequences can be serious. Rural communities already face longer journeys to hospitals and benefit from fewer local services. Unreliable mobile coverage only deepens the divide between rural and urban Britain.
A point that has not yet been touched on is smart meter connectivity, which is a particular concern in my community. Households have been encouraged to adopt smart meters to improve efficiency and accuracy, yet in many rural areas, poor mobile coverage means that those meters cannot function properly. Constituents are left with devices that cannot transmit readings automatically, undermining confidence in both the technology and the wider energy transition. If rural households are asked to modernise, the supporting infrastructure must be fit for purpose.
I am also deeply concerned by the decision taken by many mobile phone providers to switch off their 2G and 3G network signals. While modernisation is undoubtedly necessary, those networks remain the only reliable options in many rural areas. Turning them off before robust 4G or 5G alternatives are fully in place risks leaving residents with worse service than before. That decision affects not only phones, but telecare devices, alarm systems, payment terminals and agricultural equipment. Vulnerable individuals who rely on telecare linked to legacy networks could face serious risks if signals are withdrawn prematurely.
I know from my own experience driving around my Scottish Borders constituency, and from speaking with my constituency neighbour, my right hon. Friend the Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell), that we are finding it increasingly difficult to do our work as MPs. In the past, we have had relatively good mobile phone signal, but because network providers have decided to drop the service, we have lost the ability to use our phones. When we raise that with the phone providers, they say that it is all fine. The hon. Member for North Shropshire made this point in relation to the Ofcom data. I believe that for Ofcom, EDGE signal, or E, is sufficient, but to make a phone call, access emails or use any other basic phone functions, the E signal is simply not sufficient.
Similarly, I do my weekly commute along the east coast main line from Berwick-upon-Tweed station to Kings Cross. In the past, I had a very good signal for the duration of the journey. Now, I get usable signal—not the signal that appears to satisfy Ofcom—only when I am in the centre of Newcastle station, the centre of York station or approaching London. Unless I can get LNER wi-fi, I cannot effectively use my phone anywhere else in between.
Telecoms companies have commercial interests, but they also have responsibilities. I urge the Government to engage closely with providers to ensure that no community is left without reliable service as networks evolve. The shared rural network is welcome, but delivery must be accelerated in the Scottish Borders, across Scotland and in all parts of rural Britain. Rural Britain does not seek special treatment—only fair treatment. Reliable connectivity is essential to economic growth, public services and community life. If we are to build a truly connected United Kingdom, rural connectivity must be a priority, not an afterthought.
Jayne Kirkham (Truro and Falmouth) (Lab/Co-op)
Mobile coverage in my constituency is not good at the best of times. Although we are frequently told by the big four mobile network providers that they have 99% 4G coverage in the UK, including in my constituency, that does not ring true to anyone who, like me, is from Cornwall, and therefore knows what it is like to struggle regularly to get signal. Where there is 5G coverage, it is often from a single provider, and not one premises has 5G coverage from all four providers. Last year, Which? and Opensignal produced a mobile network quality map for the year, by using real-world data from people’s phones and assigning a score to each postcode. TR4, which covers places like Chacewater, Trispen and St Erme in my constituency, ranked the second worst for network quality, with a consistent 4G or 5G signal just 57% of the time. Sadly, that is not at all surprising.
As a rural part of the world, we have often struggled with connectivity. That has a particular impact on rural businesses, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham) pointed out, including farms, which still experience poor mobile and broadband service. Data from the NFU shows that just 33% of farming businesses have access to fibre, while only 22% report reliable mobile signal across their farm. Despite that, support schemes like the sustainable farming incentive and communication with the Rural Payments Agency are increasingly done online, so digital connectivity is more important to farmers than ever before.
Mobile coverage in my constituency failed spectacularly last month when Storm Goretti struck Cornwall, triggering a rare Met Office red warning, with gusts of about 100 mph. The storm caused widespread power outages and brought down over 1,000 trees, leaving many people completely cut off, with no internet and poor mobile phone signal. The new digital landlines that replaced the old copper networks did not work without power, and Ofcom’s rules require only one hour of battery back-up for vulnerable customers, which is completely inadequate. This meant that for days, and in some cases weeks, large parts of Cornwall were disconnected from the outside world, with no means of accessing information or getting assistance. For many, that was very frightening and showed how in some circumstances, mobile connectivity really could mean life or death.
The loss of telecommunications and poor signal made it harder for responders to identify and support vulnerable residents. Unlike the national grid, Openreach relied on people contacting their service provider to say they were offline, which was not sufficient in a context where many residents had no internet or phone signal. This was not helped by the fact that the providers generally displayed minimal customer service, and it was impossible to get through to human beings in many cases. There was then another layer of delay while the providers reported to Openreach, which had no map of the areas that were offline.
Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making a powerful point about the role of Openreach in this scenario. I have said for some time that its role is equivalent to that of electricity distribution network operators. Although we all pay our bills to an electricity company, it is the distribution network that is responsible for getting our power back on, but Openreach delegates that to the individual service providers. Openreach needs to do more to look after the customers who are affected in these instances.
Jayne Kirkham
I agree. Although mobile providers are a category 2 responder under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 framework, they do not have the duties, responsibilities and powers that, say, National Grid or water companies do. There is a strong argument for changing that.
Furthermore, the storm exposed the fact that most mobile masts do not have back-up generators or meaningful battery reserves, making them highly vulnerable to power loss. That contrasts with the expectations placed on water and electricity companies, which operate under established resilience duties. Telecoms providers are arguably just as essential, and the civil contingencies framework should reflect that reality in practice, not just in statute. We need stronger requirements and powers for comms providers in emergency situations, and Ofcom needs the teeth to enforce them.
Storm Goretti demonstrated how dependent communities and responders now are on digital and mobile networks, and it showed the weakness and lack of resilience of those networks in rural places like Cornwall. As Private Eye pointed out, an Ofcom technical report from last year noted that roughly two thirds of the population would be able to make emergency calls in a power outage of under an hour. The number who would be able to do so by the six-hour mark was redacted and described as being “far fewer”.
As extreme weather becomes more frequent, it is crucial that rural areas are better connected. The deadline for nationwide 5G coverage has been pushed back to 2032, but communities like mine cannot wait, as these severe weather experiences become more and more frequent. The Minister has indicated that places like Cornwall could be pilot areas for emergency resilience measures, and I very much look forward to that work beginning as soon as possible.
Charlotte Cane (Ely and East Cambridgeshire) (LD)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) on securing this important debate. I agree with much of what she said in her speech, and much of what other hon. Members have said.
My hon. Friend’s constituency shares many similarities with mine: they are a comparable size, have a comparable population, contain much farmland and have scattering of medium-sized settlements. In my case, those settlements include the city of Ely, which is home to over 20,000 residents. According to Ofcom’s coverage map, the entire city is covered by all mobile network operators, with at least “good outdoor” coverage. Given such confidence, I invite Ofcom inspectors to Ely, where I will challenge them to catch even a single bar of mobile signal in the city centre. They will be sorely disappointed. Instead, the Government could look at data gathered by a number of different independent sources that reports remarkably poor mobile service in areas of my constituency that Ofcom claims are covered.
Alternatively, the Government could simply listen to local people. They would hear from local business owners in Ely market square who cannot get a signal for their card machines; residents, such as my constituent Alan, who has tried to install a smart energy meter in his home on four occasions, each unsuccessful because of insufficient mobile signal, which is not only irritating but means he cannot get the cheapest fuel options that are available only to people who have working smart meters; or the new restaurant in the middle of the city centre that cannot take orders because it cannot get internet or mobile signal.
Rather fittingly in a debate about mobile connectivity, the major failure in the Government’s approach thus far appears to be a total lack of communication and connection with the lived experiences of citizens on the ground. The Government claim that mobile coverage has reached 96% of the country, but thousands of my constituents in Ely and East Cambridgeshire—and, I am willing to bet, in almost every other rural constituency—would beg to differ.
Given the way that the Government are assessing coverage, serious doubts are raised over the sincerity of their connectivity goals overall, including the roll-out of the shared rural network. Although that is due to be complete by this time next year, the Government seem to have minimal capacity to direct investment and new infrastructure to reach their goals, relying instead, as we have heard, on the mobile network operators, who put commercial interests above the interests of our constituents.
Richard Foord (Honiton and Sidmouth) (LD)
One of those commercial operators is O2. My constituent, Martin Ferdinando, contacted O2 over 40 times. He was offered a handset, a new 5G SIM, an escalation to the ombudsman and, in the end, a £125 goodwill payment. Does my hon. Friend agree with me that our constituents do not want such “goodwill” payments and that what they want is a functioning mobile system, which would be developed if we had a proper shared rural network?
Charlotte Cane
I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. Our constituents do not want compensation or apologies: they want a mobile signal that they can rely on. How can they have confidence that their digital connectivity will improve if Ofcom does not engage with a reliable reporting system to direct investment in response to on-the-ground need? Conversely, there is bit of my constituency that allegedly has no connectivity, but every time I go there I have no problem getting a mobile signal, so ironically there are some places where the signal is better than Ofcom thinks.
In an era when public services are increasingly moving online, rural and digitally excluded populations risk becoming increasingly isolated. Good mobile connectivity must be considered a basic necessity and not an object for compromise. It is especially essential for accessing emergency services, defibrillators and on-call healthcare, a major concern for the many farmers in my constituency who experience lower-than-average health outcomes and work in more accident-prone environments, yet have very limited connectivity.
I think the Government would agree with me that we should move towards greater access to healthcare in the community, foster social connection and ensure safely policed neighbourhoods. However, key to each of those is guaranteeing the rights of all, including those in rural areas, to swift and ready access to mobile signal. More than that, it also means a reliable process of reporting and mapping the real-terms coverage and capacity of mobile networks.
Fundamentally, improving rural mobile connectivity must start with genuine two-way communication. Will the Minister now agree to overhaul Ofcom’s coverage maps so that they are tied to real-time data, and to revise the coverage goals of the shared rural network accordingly so that my constituents, and the many others we have heard about, can finally get an assurance that a reliable connection is on its way—and soon?
Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) for bringing forward this delayed but important debate. My constituency includes the very rural area of north Cumbria, bordering Scotland and Northumberland. It is beautiful, remote and, in parts, devoid of mobile coverage.
The lack of mobile connectivity is a particular issue in winter months, as we have heard, when snow and wind block roads and bring down power lines. As has been said, the shutdown of the public switched telephone network means that a loss of power to landlines, coupled with a paucity of mobile coverage, now leaves many of my constituents not only without telephony, but without any means of letting their electricity distribution network know that they have no power at all.
It is a year since Ofcom published the findings of its consultation on mobile RAN—radio access network—power resilience. I will forgive Members if they have not read it as I have. Currently, the regulator suggests a minimum back-up duration of just four hours for mobile RAN sites—the masts—and a minimum duration of one hour for battery back-up units for fixed-line phones, as we have heard.
Last year, however, a power cut affecting the village of Kershopefoot, which sits on the border of my constituency and that of the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont), lasted five days. I therefore think that a sensible and proportionate solution would be for Ofcom to require mobile networks to maintain a small fleet of electricity generators that could be used to power masts until the electricity grid can be repaired. I would welcome the Minister’s thoughts on that point and an assurance that he will press Ofcom to go further on the issue of RAN resilience.
I will turn to the factors that determine the ability of mobile network operators to improve and maintain coverage: network investment, planning policy and spectrum availability. The first factor is principally a matter for shareholders, but the Government clearly have a role in creating the right conditions for investment, safeguarding competition and removing the policy barriers to network expansion. That brings me to the second factor, which is planning policy. I strongly urge the Minister to engage constructively with Mobile UK on the reform of permitted development rights and the notice to quit regime, which can see mobile operators forced from sites before a new site can be built.
That leaves the third factor, which is spectrum—a subject in which I take an unusual interest, having witnessed at first hand the contrasting approaches, and their consequences, of the Blair and Cameron Governments. The UK’s 3G spectrum auction in 2000 was designed not only to inject competition into the mobile market by reserving a licence for a new entrant, but to create a level playing field by preventing the incumbent networks from using their existing spectrum for 3G services. The effect was to create a level playing field and a competitive market for 3G services, with the result that the UK became the first country in the world to deploy a commercial 3G network. Prices fell, innovation grew and new services were spawned.
As take-up grew, more spectrum had to become available for 3G and 4G services, but simply allowing the four networks that had legacy spectrum to reuse it for 3G services would not only give them a competitive advantage over the newer entrant, but distort competition between the incumbent networks that held different spectrum frequencies. Different frequencies mean different capabilities. In particular, lower frequency spectrum is essential for getting coverage in rural areas.
The then Labour Government’s solution was to direct the regulator to take back the legacy spectrum and reallocate it to maintain a level playing field and maximise competition. Unfortunately, the 2010 election intervened before the legislation to direct Ofcom could pass, and in January 2011 the Cameron Government allowed the incumbent networks to use their 2G spectrum, creating, in the words of the new entrant, a “competitive distortion”—one that I argue has driven the consolidation in the market over the last decade, weakened competitive pressure on the networks to expand their coverage, particularly in rural areas, and left the taxpayer to pick up the tab for a market failure that was entirely avoidable. I urge the Minister, in matters of spectrum, to be more Blair and less Cameron, and ensure that this Government have a spectrum policy that supports a competitive mobile market that benefits every corner and field of our country.
Mims Davies (East Grinstead and Uckfield) (Con)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to contribute to this important debate on an issue that affects so many of my constituents and matters so much to us all. I thank the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) for opening it, and for resecuring it from the Backbench Business Committee.
I echo many of the sentiments expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont). I felt like he was reading my speech, but I found it particularly interesting to reflect that my constituency is between 30 miles and 60 miles from Westminster. I think that sums up some of the challenges that we all face in this area. My constituency of East Grinstead, Uckfield and the villages contains many very rural areas, as well as parts of Haywards Heath and Burgess Hill, and mobile connectivity is a major issue that people write to me about and raise with me in person in and around the constituency.
It is with great sadness that I tell the House just before Valentine’s day that, since the boundary changes, I have had to leave one of the longest relationships I have ever had—with Vodafone. It was failing and, yes, I walked out. I am afraid that connectivity, particularly where new housing has been built, has been dire. I have said to my family, friends and colleagues, “Don’t bother to call. You won’t get through.” I am a bit embarrassed to say this, but I recently semi-kidnapped one of VodafoneThree’s parliamentary affairs gentlemen—he knows who he is—to drive him around my constituency and show him where the actual signal simply does not match what the company has on its maps and what it sells people in its shops.
Throughout 2025, I met mobile providers and ran a constituency survey. I am grateful to all those who contributed. Around 90% said that they have been affected by a complete lack of service, and 132 reported that they rarely or never have a signal. The areas of my constituency that are most affected are the chronic notspots of Horsted Keynes, Fairwarp, Maresfield and the wider Ashdown Forest, Wivelsfield and Isfield. People in those areas said that they never have a signal, despite constant complaints to their providers, and that their visitors are surprised that there is
“no decent signal in 2025”.
I represent a rural Sussex constituency, but it has areas that are more urban, and people there report problems too. Constituents in East Grinstead say that the signal in the town centre is almost unusable, and miles away on the outskirts, such as down in the village of Ashurst Wood, there are near dead zones where—as the hon. Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham), who is not in her place, described—going online is near impossible.
My parish councils have been doing much of the heavy lifting in representing the concerns of people across the constituency. People’s calls drop out, they are cut off in the event of a power cut, they are unable to do online banking, and their purchases fail because verification codes sometimes take days or do not come at all. For self-employed people, remote workers and people who are trying to run small or micro businesses—a large number of the businesses in my constituency—these are serious challenges. Seventy-seven local businesses said they regularly experience severe disruption. If we want growth to support jobs and get the economy going, this is a clear infrastructure need. It is an economic issue and a public safety issue; in the event of a power cut, people cannot rely on wi-fi calling. This is a serious issue, and it endangers lives. I also absolutely agree with the point about smart meter failings.
One of the most egregious issues that I have had happened during a recent office move. It took me one month to finally get a connection from the guys at BT Openreach. That is one month of my constituency office having no broadband! I would love for the Minister to meet me and many of us, because we are universally connected by the fact that we have no connectivity. This needs to be seen as an essential service, just like water—but do not get me started on that.
Perran Moon (Camborne and Redruth) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) for securing this debate for the second time.
In rural areas like my constituency of Camborne, Redruth and Hayle, the challenges of infrastructure and connectivity differ substantially from those in urban settings. Decision makers too often hold outdated assumptions or misunderstandings about the differences between rurality and remote coastal areas like Cornwall. Policy reform is urgently needed; if we can fix it in Cornwall, we can fix it anywhere.
Substandard critical infrastructure that normally attracts little attention from policymakers becomes visible to them only when it fails. As my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Jayne Kirkham) said, that is precisely what happened on the evening of 8 January. Residents across Cornwall received red weather warnings, as winds of up to 111 mph blasted roofs from buildings, brought down telephone lines and ripped huge trees from the ground. Around 200 telegraph poles were brought down, hundreds of metres of cabling were destroyed by fallen trees, and entire areas became completely inaccessible. At the peak of the storm, more than 120,000 homes lost power.
The engineers and workers on the ground have been exceptional. I commend their commitment and professionalism, but the reality is that too many of my constituents still lack basic mobile connectivity. My hon. Friends the Members for Carlisle (Ms Minns) and for Truro and Falmouth have commented on the requirement for back-up power for masts and on the failings of both Ofcom and Openreach. I was pleased to meet Minister Baroness Lloyd yesterday, along with Cornish colleagues, to raise those issues directly.
Alongside the immediate disruption, we face the ongoing problem of the system reverting to business as usual after the crisis. According to Cellnex, based on data from Ofcom, all six Cornish constituencies appear at the bottom of the UK mobile connectivity list. The mobile market review, which runs until 21 April, is a crucial opportunity to change that. We fundamentally need a higher standard of service quality and robust and transparent measurement so that improvements in mobile connectivity actually translate into benefits for customers.
Richard Foord
The hon. Gentleman is talking about the frustrations in Cornwall, which my constituents really can relate to. This issue is peninsula-wide, across Devon and Cornwall. Only 52% of mid and east Devon is covered by 5G, compared with 62% nationally. Does he recognise that this is about our remote south-west peninsula?
Perran Moon
Yes, I do, but there are other parts of the United Kingdom with this issue. It is not just in south-west England and Cornwall, but in areas further north, as we have heard. There is an opportunity to really focus on those areas so that they are not left behind in the digital transition.
Here is why this issue is so important. The Government are investing tens of millions of pounds in critical minerals and renewables in order to unleash the Cornish Celtic tiger. That investment is designed to unlock private investment into those growth sectors, but investment will be directly hamstrung by the paucity of mobile communications. It is fair to say that in Cornwall, as well as other places, we are fed up with being left behind in the digital transition. When the Minister gets to his feet, will he please commit to taking this moment to work across Government to transform the weaknesses in Cornwall’s mobile communications into strength? That way, businesses can grow, and no one will ever again be left in the dark, with no way of communicating with the outside world.
Ann Davies (Caerfyrddin) (PC)
I congratulate the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) on securing this debate. Over the past 20 months or so since coming into this House, I think that rural connectivity has been the most constant issue in my inbox, which is really not surprising when we consider the fact that my constituency is 69% rural and still suffers from a large number of notspots.
A report issued by Vodafone in November 2023 found that nearly half of rural deprived areas are classed as 5G notspots, whereas the same can be said of only 2.7% of urban deprived areas. Ofcom’s “Connected Nations” report, published in November 2025, provided further evidence of rural areas lagging behind urban areas in both 5G and 4G access. Both those reports show how rural connectivity falls short of what urban areas receive.
Over the past few years, the shared rural network, which is funded through private investment and public money, has worked reasonably well in Caerfyrddin, with an additional number of masts being built in hard-to-reach areas. Like the hon. Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham), I have had two masts built in my constituency on the shared rural network scheme, but neither has been switched on. The mast in Myddfai has power and is ready to go, but Vodafone is yet to turn on the network. In Llanwinio, the mast has been built—again, over a year ago—but there is still no power connected to it. Its electricity was due to be connected in January, but based on the timescale for building the Myddfai mast, we could be waiting another year before connectivity is switched on—it really is not good enough. Public purse funding has been poured into both mast projects, and there is nothing to show for it, at a time when digital connectivity is seriously needed.
Broadband access in the rural parts of my constituency is also not good enough. Rural businesses, including farms, now rely on connectivity for all transactions, including banking, tax and VAT returns, reports on the British Cattle Movement Service’s cattle tracing system and payments in our rural village shops. The results from the National Farmers Union’s rural digital survey are worrying. As has been mentioned, 21% of respondents have broadband speeds of less than 10 megabits per second, compared with the national average of less than 1%, and only 22% report having reliable mobile signal across their entire farms. It is just not good enough.
Rural homes and businesses must be able to contact emergency services as and when they need to. During Storm Darragh, which was far worse for us than any of the recent storms, the digitalisation of our tele- communication systems meant that the networks failed. Although batteries help, according to one of my constituents just last week, businesses are not eligible for those, as only domestic dwellings can have battery back-ups. People were left with no means of communication and unable to reach emergency services, which is unacceptable. We must ensure that when public money is spent on upgrading networks, they are switched on and actually work for the communities in which they are built.
Finally, Caerfyrddin includes some of the hardest-to-reach homes, with properties tucked deep into valleys or set in extremely remote locations. In those areas, it is much harder for traditional masts to provide reliable coverage, no matter how many are built. That is why it is essential that a satellite solution is available and affordable for all the households that will otherwise be left behind. Starlink currently charges around £75 per month for network coverage, which is not affordable for many of my constituents. I hope that in the next year or so competition will make that cheaper, and that other companies can provide that service. Whatever system communities and constituents use, it must work. It must be reliable and affordable, especially when public money has been used in good faith.
Bradley Thomas (Bromsgrove) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) on being persistent and finally securing this very important debate.
Few phrases in modern Britain ring as hollow as “world-class connectivity”. Speaking plainly, rural mobile phone connectivity in this country is not merely patchy or inconsistent; in some places, it is so poor that the advertised service bears no resemblance to reality. There are areas in which actual service levels are hundreds of times worse than advertised—that is not a rounding error, or the result of momentary network congestion. It is a difference between promise and performance that is so vast that it would be comic if it were not so economically corrosive.
Take Worcestershire, for example. It is a rural county, with lots of villages, small towns and industrious small businesses. There are farms and villages where the coverage map glows reassuringly in bright corporate colours, but the lived reality is far too often just a single bar if you stand at the upstairs window, facing north and holding your phone aloft like some kind of digital divining rod. We have already heard about how the River Severn Partnership in Worcestershire was a beneficiary of this. Quite innovatively, local councils stuck gadgets on the bin lorries that went up and down every single road, particularly the rural roads, and realised what we probably all suspect: how terrible the service is. In parts of Worcestershire, the mobile phone signal is around 900 times worse than the mobile phone operators claim.
We could forgive the odd dropped call. After all, rural topography presents challenges—there are hills, and trees are inconveniently organic. What cannot be forgiven, though, is the persistent gulf between what is claimed and what is delivered. It is the same with broadband; we hear broadband providers advertise speeds of up to 80 megabits per second, but the reality of what many of my constituents experience is very different. Those advertised figures are in the realm of fiction. This is not just anecdotal grumbling from the shires; a survey by the National Farmers Union has painted a sobering picture, with 21% of respondents reporting broadband speeds under 10 megabits per second in 2026. This is at a time when a single video could devour bandwidth instantly. What my constituents want is the ability to consume data and make voice calls at the same time. I cannot stress enough how sick and tired I am of hearing from mobile phone companies that everyone is just consuming data. As the traditional telephone service is switched off, constituents—particularly those living in rural areas—are increasingly reliant on the ability to make voice calls.
The lived reality for a business in rural Worcestershire attempting to submit mandatory forms online to a regulator or placing an order, is that they must drive to the nearest town to do so. Businesses cannot reliably place orders or process card payments. As banks close in our towns and villages, people are shifting or being pushed towards more online digital services, so it is crucial that we have the mobile connectivity to back that up. If I may say so, there is also a little bit of cultural condescension at work. Rural Britain is far too frequently romanticised as a place of bucolic tranquillity; it is that, but it demands parity with urban Britain at the same time. What does that mean? It means that we want a reliable mobile phone signal, so that we can drive down the road on a short journey without it cutting out, and if we need to receive a call from a loved one, a relative or perhaps a GP, we can have certainty that that call will come through.
Coverage maps have been drawn with a particularly optimistic crayon, and the problem with advertised speeds being hundreds of times better than reality is not merely technical; it also erodes trust. Quite often, those conditions are laboratory conditions that do not bear any resemblance to reality, so I invite the mobile phone companies to come and do a very thorough inspection across Bromsgrove and the villages.
Mims Davies
I concur with every word that my hon. Friend is saying, particularly around the challenges in national parks, where connectivity can be more difficult. If I may, I will take him back to his point about callbacks from GPs or people working remotely, differently and flexibly. Missing that callback is a real problem for anyone, but it can be particularly serious for people in rural areas.
Bradley Thomas
My hon. Friend is spot on. Constituents, particularly older residents, have contacted me because they have missed out on crucial calls from GPs and other supporting services that they require. It is about the safety and wellbeing of our constituents as much as it is about connectivity and the economy.
In the limited time that I have, I have a few points that I implore the Government to focus on. First, transparency must improve. That means bolstering regulatory requirements for the mobile phone companies to advertise speeds that are realistic, not theoretical and based on laboratory conditions. Secondly, it is not just about population coverage, but geographic coverage, which must carry greater regulatory weight. Britain is not composed solely of cities. Land matters, and the people who steward it and rely on these mobile phone connections matter. That means that the Government should give serious consideration to rural roaming. Finally, infrastructure sharing should be pursued with seriousness to ensure that mobile phone coverage across the country, but particularly across Bromsgrove and the villages, is as robust as it can be.
Aphra Brandreth (Chester South and Eddisbury) (Con)
I thank my constituency neighbour the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) for securing this important debate. From Tilston to Tattenhall and from Acton to Audlem, poor mobile connectivity is all too common across Chester South and Eddisbury, but the House need not take my word for it. Earlier this year, I launched a mobile connectivity survey, and I take this opportunity to thank the 544 residents who took the time to complete it.
It is vital to get the real experiences of people living and working in Chester South and Eddisbury, because, as we have heard from other Members today, the level of coverage that Ofcom and the mobile network operators claim, all too often does not reflect reality. Ofcom gives statistics based on modelling, not on-the-ground evidence. It does not differentiate between 4G and 5G coverage and, crucially, it does not test network capacity.
In my mobile survey, I asked constituents on a scale of 1 to 10—where 1 is very poor and 10 is excellent—to rate different aspects of their mobile service. The average score for both the signal to make and receive calls, and the average reliability for calls was just 3 out of 10. The ability to stream or download larger files scored even lower, and many shared their experiences of poor levels of signal and data making it impossible to even download messages or emails.
I asked whether constituents could get a usable phone signal in the main areas of their home. Of the 544 respondents, almost 300 said they could not. It is worth pausing to reflect on that. More than half my constituents surveyed cannot get a usable mobile phone signal in their own home. That is simply unacceptable in 21st-century Britain, and the consequences are very real. We know that since the pandemic, more people are working from home, making reliable connectivity vital. According to the Office for National Statistics, nearly 10 million people in the UK are hybrid workers, with a further 5 million working exclusively from home. It is now a fundamental part of our modern economy. If the Government are serious about economic growth, addressing poor mobile connectivity, particularly in rural areas, must be part of that plan.
The impact is not only economic, but social. Digital isolation compounds physical isolation. Not being able to rely on a mobile connection to contact friends, family or support services can have serious negative impacts on mental health. There is also a safety dimension to this issue. As more services become digital by default, rural residents are increasingly disadvantaged, unable to reliably take calls from doctors, carers or other essential providers. Constituents have raised concerns about being unable to make calls in emergencies, particularly in more remote rural areas. That is not simply inconvenient; it is dangerous.
What my constituents need is meaningful action. I urge the Minister to consider the views of people across Chester South and Eddisbury who completed my mobile survey, and to share in the Government’s response what steps are currently being taken to work with providers, particularly in the rural context, to address the unacceptable gaps in coverage. We need reliable mobile connectivity for work, for school, to make doctor’s appointments and to connect with friends. I will continue to push the Government, so that all villages—including Audlem, Wybunbury, Wrenbury, Malpas, Tattenhall, Tilston, Farndon, Christleton and so many more—get the connection that they rightly expect and deserve.
James MacCleary (Lewes) (LD)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) on securing this really important debate. One of the issues that appears most often in my constituency mailbag is digital connectivity, as it affects thousands of my constituents. It has become as essential to modern life as electricity or roads. The issue is absolutely fundamental to the future viability of rural communities, not just in my constituency but across the whole country.
I will share some examples from constituents who have been in touch with me recently—real people facing real problems in their daily lives. There is a woman living in Deanland Wood Park, a park home site in my constituency, who can only use her mobile phone when she is out and about. Let me be clear about what that means: in her own home—the place where she should feel most comfortable, secure and connected—her phone is essentially useless to her.
There are a couple living in the village of Berwick. One is with Tesco Mobile, and the other is with Vodafone. Neither of them can receive calls when they are at home. This is not merely an inconvenience; it has a huge impact on their work. He has had to completely change how he communicates with clients, and relies entirely on email and WhatsApp because he simply cannot depend on phone calls. What truly concerns me is that her father is in a care home, and he does not always get through when he calls. Hon. Members can imagine the stress it causes when an elderly man tries to reach his daughter and the technology simply fails both of them. Their phones work perfectly well when they leave Berwick; there is purely a problem of coverage in the village itself.
I recently heard from a couple who have moved to my constituency from rural Staffordshire. They were genuinely shocked to discover that they have no signal whatsoever in their new home in East Dean. They have moved from one rural area to another, and somehow our connectivity is even worse than what they left behind. At one of my advice surgeries, I spoke to a farmer from the same village who is dealing with the same problem, and this is where it becomes really serious. What happens if someone on his farm needs to call the emergency services? What if there is an accident, a medical emergency or a fire? Every second counts in those situations, and it is not just about emergencies. Try doing online banking or running a business without mobile connectivity. Try doing any of the things that we are all expected to do online these days, and which those of us in towns and cities can largely take for granted.
A gentleman in the village of Upper Dicker regularly has to drive to his son’s house just to use his phone, because the signal at home is so poor. Every time a website needs to text him a verification code—something that happens more and more these days—he is stuck. He cannot access his bank account or log into Government services. He cannot do any of the things that we are increasingly required to do online.
According to research published last year, the UK has the worst average 5G download speeds of all G7 countries. We are not slightly behind; we are dead last. When one looks at rural coverage specifically, the picture is even more concerning. Only 69% of rural areas in the UK are said to receive 4G coverage through the four major mobile network providers—not 5G but 4G, which is technology that is already years old, and we are at just 69%. So much of what we are told is 3G, 4G or 5G is actually mislabelled. The signal bars on phones can be deeply misleading. There might be full bars and the assumption is that everything is fine, but when trying to make a call or load a webpage, suddenly you realise that those bars do not mean what you thought they meant.
In rural areas, poor connectivity is fundamentally undermining the viability of our communities. It is not just annoying; it is existential. Young families cannot move to rural areas or stay there, because they cannot work from home. Businesses cannot operate effectively, and elderly residents cannot stay in touch with family or access online health services. Farmers cannot use modern agricultural technology, and students cannot do their homework. The digital divide is no longer just about cities versus countryside; it is about whether rural communities can survive and thrive in the 21st century.
The inequality of provision as the 5G network is rolled out is deeply concerning. It is simply wrong that people should be disadvantaged because of where they live. Someone’s postcode should not determine whether they can fully participate in a modern society. We must ensure that improving broadband and mobile connectivity starts with the hardest-to-reach areas first—not as an afterthought and not eventually, but first. I recently met Vodafone, which is responsible for the roll-out in our part of Sussex, to press that point.
The Government must also prioritise major investment in broadband for underserved communities, and here there is an economic argument. Investment in these areas will help unlock the vast potential of our rural communities. Research has demonstrated that ubiquitous 5G could add £159 billion to the UK economy by 2035. That means not just money for telecoms companies, but businesses in our rural communities operating more effectively.
I am asking on behalf of my constituents for the Government to live up to their promises to invest properly in rural connectivity and ensure that companies such as Openreach and Vodafone communicate clearly with residents and meet their commitments. The woman in Deanland Wood Park deserves to use her phone in her own home, the couple in Berwick deserve to do their jobs and stay in touch with their elderly parents without constant stress, the farmer in East Dean deserves to know that he can call for help if there is an emergency, and the gentleman in Upper Dicker deserves to log into his bank account without driving across my constituency. My constituents deserve better and rural constituencies across the country deserve better, too.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.
Anna Sabine (Frome and East Somerset) (LD)
I very much thank my hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) for bringing forward this debate on a subject she knows so much about and on which she is such a passionate campaigner.
Rural areas are too often the last in the queue when it comes to decent mobile internet connectivity. I certainly receive many emails—although not as many as I probably would if they were better connected—as well as calls and letters from constituents who tell me how woeful mobile connectivity is in parts of Frome and East Somerset. One elderly constituent told me how anxious she is that she or her husband will suffer a fall and have no way to contact the emergency services as their home has no mobile signal.
The Liberal Democrats believe that mobile coverage is a basic utility that is as essential these days as running water. People need mobile connectivity when they are travelling, working, running businesses or responding to emergencies. Yet for too long, Government targets have not been ambitious enough, and have been based on connecting households directly rather than on geographical coverage. The Government claim to have reached 95% of geographical broadband coverage, but residents in rural areas tell a very different story, and the problem lies in how coverage is measured.
A constituent wrote to me about persistent signal blackspots throughout the village of Rode. He told me he no longer expects to receive any mobile signal at his home. Ofcom’s mobile coverage checker suggests he should have a strong outdoor signal from every provider, but his experience proves otherwise. This is why we support a nationwide programme to install hyperfast fibre optic broadband across the UK, with a particular focus on connecting rural areas. Ofcom’s capability to understand coverage relies on measurements based on grids of 100 metres by 100 metres, which means that vast swathes of rural areas are underserved in areas such as Rode. More accurate techniques based on smaller grids would offer better coverage pictures to allow for targeted support.
Rural businesses are crying out for better connectivity. A survey by the Countryside Alliance found that 85% of rural businesses cited their connectivity as poor but manageable, with 80% saying better-quality connectivity would be the single largest improvement to their business. In Midsomer Norton, a fairly sizeable market town in my constituency, Zen Rebel Studios has long struggled with poor mobile signal and inadequate broadband. Mobile reception inside its premises is extremely limited, and despite being only a few metres off the high street, it has been unable to secure an extension of the fibre network. As a result, only a handful of people using its café can currently use its wi-fi at any one time before the system crashes, which is simply not sustainable for a modern business.
This really matters for productivity. Rural areas are 18% less productive than the national average. Closing this gap would be worth up to £43 billion in England alone, creating hundreds of thousands of jobs in areas too often blighted by underemployment. Some rural stakeholders have complained about a lack of transparency about where coverage improvements will be delivered. Ultimately, it is up to the mobile network operators to decide where to deploy coverage.
The Government and Ofcom do not have legal powers to force them to build masts in specific locations. However, when the hon. Member for Rhondda and Ogmore (Chris Bryant) served as Minister for Data Protection and Telecoms, he convened a working group with MPs and mobile providers to explore how to accelerate mast installation and improve rural mobile coverage. Unfortunately, this has not yet been restarted under the current Minister, who I hope will consider reinstating it.
I want to conclude by raising something that has not yet come up, but which is a consequence of rural connectivity failure that goes beyond economics or inconvenience. I have a constituent who, after leaving a long-term coercively controlling relationship, experienced sustained cyber-intrusion by his former partner over several days. He reported it to the police and obtained a crime number, but his abuser retained sole control of the broadband account for the home in which he was living. As the coercive controller was the named bill payer, my constituent could not take over the account. His former partner explicitly refused to release it, even when requested to do so during separation proceedings.
Here is where the absence of mobile coverage becomes critical: there is zero mobile signal at my constituent’s property. In fact, that goes for the whole village. Broadband was therefore his only means of communication. His abuser controlled whether he could make a telephone call, access support services or even work. Through locked devices connected to the network, my constituent remained vulnerable to surveillance. A private security sweep, costing £5,000, discovered that his TV sound bar had been configured as a listening device. He had to live with his wi-fi turned off, activating it only when absolutely necessary, leaving him feeling desperately vulnerable and unable call for help during the moments it was on.
My constituent contacted his broadband provider four times and, while staff were compassionate and escalated the situation, there was no safeguarding protocol available to them and no mechanism to transfer control. His former partner continued controlling his internet access and which devices could connect. Currently, broadband is regulated as a consumer contract and not as essential infrastructure; while an energy supplier would have had to recognise domestic abuse and allow an account transfer, telecommunications providers face no such duty. When reviewing rural connectivity policy, will the Minister also consider requiring telecoms providers to have such safeguarding mechanisms, and will they ensure that where police evidence documents abuse, broadband control can be transferred to the person at risk?
I am sure that the Minister hears similar frustrations from his own constituents as we have heard today, and I hope he recognises how urgently these issues need addressing. If we are serious about protecting people, supporting rural communities and enabling economic growth, we must treat digital access as the essential service it has become.
Peter Fortune (Bromley and Biggin Hill) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) on securing this debate and thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting it. I also thank all hon. Members for their valuable contributions.
The previous Conservative Government understood the importance of UK-wide mobile and broadband coverage to the public and to our economy. That is why they put in place ambitious plans to ensure that people across the United Kingdom have access to this essential infrastructure, regardless of their location. The shared rural network, announced in 2020, secured significant investment of around £500 million from the largest mobile network operators. Under the SRN, private investment is complemented by Government funding for the construction of masts in the most underserved locations, with additional coverage provided by the emergency services network programme.
For 4G, the Conservative Government set a target of 95% geographic coverage from at least one mobile network operator by the end of 2025. By January 2025, 30 Government-funded mast upgrades went live, enhancing local connectivity without erecting new masts. According to Ofcom, as of July 2025, 96% of the UK landmass had 4G coverage from at least one operator, exceeding the previous Government’s target. I am proud of the Conservative Government’s record of delivery under the SRN and I welcome the fact that this Government maintain the coverage commitments made under the scheme.
Despite the progress made up to this point, there are still some acute challenges, as we have heard from Members today. My hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) talked about the reality of living in rural areas with poor coverage, which was echoed by the hon. Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham), and the impact it has, especially on farmers. He also made an important point about the switch from 2G and 3G to 4G and not rushing that process.
The hon. Member for Ely and East Cambridgeshire (Charlotte Cane) must let us know if Ofcom takes up her generous offer to come and visit. Knowing how beautiful Ely is, it would be mad not to do so.
I was very sad to hear that my hon. Friend the Member for East Grinstead and Uckfield (Mims Davies) had split up with Vodafone.
Peter Fortune
It is sad, but with Valentine’s day just around the corner, perhaps there is the opportunity to reconnect. [Interruption.] It is my first time as a Front Bencher! It was good to hear from the hon. Member for Caerfyrddin (Ann Davies), who is having similar issues with Vodafone. Can I suggest that she takes a leaf out of my hon. Friend’s book and kidnaps one of its Government relations people? Maybe she will get her way that way.
My hon. Friend the Member for Chester South and Eddisbury (Aphra Brandreth), as ever, was on the front foot serving her constituents with her mobile survey, highlighting the issue of digital isolation and the impact it can have on mental health. My hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Bradley Thomas) talked about the impact on online banking and how, with the closure of front counters, we need that connectivity to keep these services alive. That was echoed by the hon. Member for Lewes (James MacCleary), who talked about the impact on real people. I was sad to hear that for my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove to take a text message, he has to run upstairs and hang out of a window to get reception. Now that I know that—
Bradley Thomas
For the avoidance of doubt, I do not have to do that, but I know many people who do.
Peter Fortune
I thank my hon. Friend for that clarification; it will save me some time, as I was going to spend all weekend texting him.
We have heard about the real issues to do with mobile phone connectivity and how it is impacting people. Based on commercial mapping of 113 local council areas across the UK, EE offers acceptable coverage in only 69% of the UK. For Vodafone the figure is 61%, for O2 it is 50% and for Three it is 38%. The Minister who previously had responsibility for this area engaged with Ofcom on improving data collection standards to get a more accurate picture of 4G coverage. That resulted in Ofcom launching its online coverage checker in June 2025, incorporating some improvements.
The need to ensure that everyone has reliable mobile phone coverage is becoming ever more pressing, as public services are increasingly digitised. The last Government recognised the need to tackle non-commercial barriers to the roll-out of digital infrastructure by amending planning legislation. However, as planning is a devolved matter, standards are not consistent across the four nations, so what discussions has the Minister had with his counterparts in the devolved Administrations on this matter?
On 5G roll-out, the Conservative Government set a target of nationwide coverage of stand-alone 5G for all populated areas of the UK by 2030. The development of this infrastructure has been market-led, and commercial investment has achieved 5G coverage from at least one operator over approximately 65% of the UK landmass.
In December, the Government launched their call for evidence on reforming planning rules to accelerate the deployment of digital infrastructure. The call for evidence is due to end on 26 February. Given the urgency of this matter, when does the Minister expect to be able to update the House on the outcome of the call for evidence and the Government’s proposals for planning reform?
Touching briefly on broadband, I welcome the publication of the draft statement of strategic priorities yesterday, and I know that businesses will appreciate the clarity that it has provided.
The continuation of the Conservatives’ commitment to competition is welcome, and it is important, as the telecoms market consolidates and the Competition and Markets Authority watches over the process, that competition is actively upheld to reduce consumer costs and continue improving services. There is clearly cross-party agreement that we need to do more to ensure that rural areas have improved connectivity, and I hope that the Minister will engage constructively with all Members who have contributed to the debate in order to achieve this.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology (Kanishka Narayan)
First and foremost, can I start by thanking the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) for securing this debate on mobile connectivity in rural areas? I thank all hon. Members for their insightful contributions.
While I am here speaking in place of my noble Friend in the other place, the Minister for Digital Economy, I feel the pain described by many hon. Members personally, as I too represent a rural constituency. In that context, I particularly thank my hon. Friends the Members for Stafford (Leigh Ingham) and for Truro and Falmouth (Jayne Kirkham) and the hon. Members for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) and for Caerfyrddin (Ann Davies) for their representations on behalf of farmers and agricultural communities, whom I know face a particular challenge.
I also thank the hon. Members for Bromsgrove (Bradley Thomas), for Chester South and Eddisbury (Aphra Brandreth) and for Lewes (James MacCleary) for talking about not only maintaining bucolic beauty but parity and economic opportunity. I thank the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Frome and East Somerset (Anna Sabine), who raised a very concerning case about coercive control through the use of connectivity. I encourage her to write to the Department about that, as I would be keen to follow up on that particular issue. The constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (Perran Moon) has features of rurality and remoteness, and has coastal communities, and from my constituency I personally understand those features too.
The all-party parliamentary group on digital communities, which the hon. Member for North Shropshire is a member of, along with the other Members, published in January a detailed report on this topic. It provided valuable insights and recommendations.
It is well understood across the House that access to high-quality, reliable and secure digital connectivity is essential to day-to-day life, with many services now requiring an online presence. It is important not only for consumers, but for the businesses in every sector of the UK economy that depend increasingly on fixed and mobile networks in some way. From taking card payments to managing businesses online, digital connectivity is central.
The focus of this debate is on mobile connectivity. The Government have an ambition for all populated areas, including rural communities, to have access to higher quality stand-alone 5G by 2030. Although stand-alone 5G is already available outside 83% of premises across the UK, I acknowledge that we need to go much further.
Operators are starting to align investment and delivery plans with the ambition that the Government have set out. VodafoneThree has committed to investing £11 billion in its 5G network over the 10-year period following completion of its merger; progress against that commitment will be monitored at regular intervals by Ofcom. BT and Virgin Media O2 have set out similarly significant investment plans into their networks, both aligning with the Government’s stand-alone 5G coverage ambition.
John Lamont
Does the Minister acknowledge that there are issues with the data that has been provided both by the telecoms companies and by Ofcom? We have all shared experiences across the Chamber today in which maps produced by Vodafone, EE or whoever appear to demonstrate good coverage in our constituencies, but the coverage on the ground is just not there. Is the Minister challenging the providers on their data?
Kanishka Narayan
I thank the hon. Member for raising that point. I will come to that question, because I recognise the gap between the aggregate picture and the experience felt on the ground.
Let me return to aggregate investment. To ensure that investment delivers coverage improvements for communities right across the UK, including in rural areas, we continue working to identify and address barriers to deployment where it is practical to do so. I may not share the significant expertise and experience of my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle (Ms Minns) with matters of spectrum, but I certainly share her enthusiasm. When I was an undergraduate student, the global example of the last Labour Government on auction design and the 3G spectrum was very much a part of my curriculum. In that spirit, I hope to take her advice and continue the spirit of Labour, not that of the last Conservative Government or of the Liberal Democrats, who were complicit in the auction challenges of that Government.
The focus on investment includes implementing the remaining provisions of the Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Act 2022. I can confirm to my hon. Friend that the Government are considering where planning rules could be relaxed to support the deployment of mobile infrastructure.
The shadow Minister mentioned the call for evidence, which is due to close on 26 February. In the usual spirit, I can confirm to him that we will make a prompt statement to the House, but I am afraid I cannot give him a specific date on this occasion.
On the reporting of mobile coverage, Members across the House are totally right to highlight the issues with its accuracy in some cases. I feel very personally the depth of their frustration; although I cannot condone the semi-kidnapping experience described by the hon. Member for East Grinstead and Uckfield (Mims Davies), she has my particular sympathies for her pre-Valentine’s break-up with Vodafone. Accurate coverage data is essential for consumers: it allows more informed decisions as to which operator provides the best level of service for life, work and travel.
Mims Davies
The way for someone to report poor signal in their area is to go to ofcom.org.uk, enter a postcode, select a provider and then provide coverage feedback—if they can get a signal. That is the irony for many of us who have to drive around rural areas trying to give feedback, hence Vodafone’s parliamentary affairs person very kindly allowing himself to be actively kidnapped to drive around and see the reality.
Kanishka Narayan
I confirm to the hon. Member that there is no sense of judgment on the Government Benches on the conduct of her cause.
The Government continue to work with Ofcom to improve the accuracy of reported mobile coverage, building on the launch of its Map Your Mobile tool in June last year. I am glad that hon. Members recognise that that is reflected in the draft statement of strategic priorities for telecoms, spectrum and post, which the Government laid before Parliament yesterday. It will remain a firm priority for the Government, and I will make sure to represent to my noble Friend the Minister for Digital Economy the concerns that have been raised today.
More accurate coverage data also allows us to understand coverage gaps. Addressing these gaps requires investment by the mobile network operators. The Government recognise that the investment climate has been difficult for the mobile sector over recent years. We are committed to working with industry to support its investment in our networks. That is why we are undertaking a mobile market review to understand the factors impacting the sector’s ability to invest, and I know that the recent digital communities APPG report calls for an independent review of the digital connectivity landscape. The mobile market review and the accompanying call for evidence, launched on Tuesday, will enable the Government to consider what we can do to support the sector too. Through the call for evidence, we are looking to gather views on the quality of mobile service and level of coverage required to harness the full benefits of stand-alone 5G, as well as where our ambitions on stand-alone 5G should go further still.
As Members will be aware, as part of our work with industry, the Chancellor and the Secretary of State chaired a roundtable yesterday with CEOs of major UK telecoms firms to discuss investment challenges, as well as agreeing to a telecoms consumer charter, which looks to strengthen transparency to empower consumers, as well as to improve support for those struggling to pay. On the provision of reliable 4G connectivity, I know it is essential to many. At the spending review in 2025, the Government committed to continuing to deliver 4G coverage in areas with little or no coverage. The shared rural network has helped to deliver 4G mobile coverage to 96% of the UK land mass from at least one operator and to 81% from all four. The publicly funded elements of the shared rural network will continue to deliver improved coverage up to January 2027, with over 100 masts already delivering new coverage across the UK.
Where there is no mobile coverage, we are starting to see some positive developments in the satellite direct-to-device market. To the point made by the hon. Member for Caerfyrddin, I also share her enthusiasm and hope for cost reductions as we have greater competition in that market. The UK is taking a pioneering step in enabling direct-to-device connectivity, moving ahead of European counterparts to unlock connectivity as well as growth across remote parts of the UK. Those developments have the potential to increase the resilience of our services and provide a back-up for crucial ones should territorial networks face disruption.
Having coverage alone is clearly not important enough by itself. As Members have raised very clearly, there needs to be confidence that mobile networks will be available in the most difficult of times and that they are secure against threats. Though the Telecommunications (Security) Act 2021 introduced a world-leading regime for the protection and security of such contexts, I know that there is more work to do. In particular, I appreciate the points made right across the House on the resilience of mobile services to power cuts. We welcome that Ofcom is completing a detailed regulatory review on that question. I will make sure that the points raised today are represented as part of Ofcom’s considerations, and in particular I will be sure to convey the concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle around possible ways of ensuring duration of support as backstops. We will ensure that the guidance for public telecommunications providers reflects evolving technologies and emerging threats, taking into account input from industry and expert advice from the National Cyber Security Centre.
Before I finish, I will address specific points raised by Members. To the hon. Member for East Grinstead and Uckfield, I would be happy to make sure that the Minister for Digital Economy meets her as part of her recurring surgeries. To my hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth, I know that he is a strong cross-Government champion for Cornwall on all matters and I will continue to make sure that we play our part in supporting the strength of his advocacy. To the hon. Member for Caerfyrddin, there are three Home Office masts in her patch and two are already activated as part of the shared rural network. I will be happy to engage with her through correspondence on her particular concerns about those masts, should she wish to raise that. To the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk who, with my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle, raised the point on 2G and 3G switch-off, though the expectation is that operators will provide broadly equivalent levels of coverage after switching off 2G, I have heard his concerns and will make sure that both the Minister and, as a consequence, the regulator are focused on the complete delivery of that aspiration.
Finally, I am conscious that the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk also asked about smart meters, as did the hon. Member for East Grinstead and Uckfield. The Data Communications Company is obligated, under the conditions of its licence, to provide smart meter network coverage to at least 99.25% of premises across Great Britain. One solution for those who do not currently have smart meter wider area network coverage, which the DCC and Government have decided to focus on, involves harnessing customers’ broadband connections to also carry out smart metering communications. We are looking at how we can use modified smart meter communications hubs, as well as additional devices, to plug the gap. That is not to say that we will not continue to focus on how we can ensure mobile connectivity plays its part in that context as well.
I am sure you wish for me to come to a prompt conclusion, Madam Deputy Speaker. First and foremost, I thank the hon. Member for North Shropshire, as I do all hon. Members for their contributions. I will continue, with them, to champion mobile connectivity across our rural communities.
Helen Morgan
I thank all hon. and right hon. Members who have contributed to the debate. I am conscious that it is the final Thursday afternoon before a recess, so it shows just how important this matter is to our constituents that so many Members have come along and made good points. Bearing that in mind, I will be brief. I have done a lot of work on this issue over the last year because of the activities of the all-party group, and it is testament to the value of a Backbench Business debate that I have learned quite a lot this afternoon as well.
I want to pick up on the point made by the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) on deteriorating signal. In many areas, this problem is getting worse not better, and we need to focus on that. The issue is probably due to the quality and capacity of the signal, rather than the coverage. We are using coverage as a shorthand, but we need a high- quality, high-capacity signal in all those places, too.
The hon. Member for Carlisle (Ms Minns) made some good points about spectrum and licensing. I fear that an opportunity has been missed given that 5G licences have already been issued without those quality parameters. The hon. Member for Caerfyrddin (Ann Davies) mentioned the importance of satellite solutions in filling in some of those gaps, which might overcome some of the planning issues, so I hope the Minister will look at that too. I thank everyone once more.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House calls on the Government and service providers to help improve mobile connectivity in rural areas.