Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Inglewood and Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom

1st reading (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 31st January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)]

My Lords, one issue that has not been raised in this debate so far is the effect on small businesses in rural areas of the poverty of mobile telephone networks. That, combined with slow or poor, and sometimes non-existent, broadband speeds, puts rural businesses at a disadvantage. So I have a great deal of sympathy with the amendments that have been spoken to, and I hope that the Minister will show similar sympathy.

[Lord Inglewood (Con)]

My Lords, I join those who have spoken in support of these amendments. Like some other noble Lords, some weeks I come up from the country to your Lordships’ House. The shortcomings of the infrastructure in rural Cumbria, where I live, is far too frequently a topic of conversation.

As a number of noble Lords have said, connectivity is the crucial aspect here, because it is now part of the essential infrastructure of contemporary life. It is important that we look at this issue from the perspective of what people need, but the reality is that what we need today may not be what we need tomorrow. We have to try to bridge the gap between the digital haves and the digital have-nots, and we achieve that by looking at the issue in the way that I have just described. Therefore, I am not approaching this matter from a kind of nerdy, technical perspective. What matters is the result as much as the means by which you get there.

Over the years, there has been a lot of debate about whether a universal service obligation should be in our law and be statutorily enforceable. I had the good fortune to chair the Communications Committee, and a number of years ago, when we conducted an inquiry into broadband, we debated this issue at length. On that occasion we reached the conclusion that what mattered was the rollout and that it was quite conceivable that a USO would get in the way. With the benefit of hindsight, that was probably a mistake, and therefore it is interesting to see the provisions for such a legal obligation coming into our legislation.

However, at the end of the day I come back to where I started with all this, and it is why I will be interested to hear what the Minister has to say. It is not the detail but the result that matters here. We have got to move into a world where the digital divide is bridged. This is particularly important for areas in the country, and I speak from that perspective, but it is also true for a number of urban areas. We seriously deny people access to a whole range of commercial, and other, aspects of contemporary life if there is not adequate connectivity. As a number of your Lordships have said, we live in a country that is adopting a different approach to industry. It is crucial to appreciate that the key to increasing wealth creation in areas outside the south-east of England—which I think everyone agrees is desirable—is improving connectivity. That is the way, as noble Lords have said, to improve the potential of SMEs outside the south-east.