Albert Owen
Main Page: Albert Owen (Labour - Ynys Môn)
Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Boston and Skegness (Matt Warman). This is not the first occasion on which he has initiated a debate on this subject. It is good to see the Minister. He is a great survivor, and has been in the same role since 2010. Not only is he knowledgeable but he is responsible for many things. He cannot blame the previous Government, but he can blame himself for some of the issues that I am about to raise.
I represent a rural and periphery constituency—an island community. Although the hon. Member for Boston and Skegness said that this is not just about rural areas, they do suffer the most. There is a double whammy for periphery communities. If people live far from large towns and cities they have to pay more for their utilities—they are not on the gas mains, for example, and mobile phone coverage is poor by comparison. Too often, rural and periphery areas are in the slow lane, so we need Government subsidies to help address that. A lot of money has been allocated, but in many areas the 95% threshold in the Government agreement with BT is simply not good enough. I have long supported universal coverage. We should start from 100%, and if there are issues, we should tackle them, rather than set a low bar of 95%, as that 5% is predominantly in rural and periphery areas.
In the recess, I went out with BT engineers to see for myself what the issues were in my predominantly rural area. I saw some of the problems that they had to consider when they rolled out broadband and moved from copper to fibre. Yes, it is a big task for them, but they have received a lot of money to do it. I suggest that the Minister should consider going for universal coverage.
There are a number of players in the field—it is not just about whether it is private or public—including the regulator, the UK Government, BT and service providers. They keep blaming one another, and the Minister and the Department should get a grip on that and place responsibility where it lies. The Welsh Government have taken a lead in Wales with a roll-out programme that brings together UK Government money—the European Union has helped with state aid—the Welsh Government and BT. I can confirm that the result in Wales is slightly better than in most parts of England. The Minister should look at best practice in devolved Administrations. In my constituency, 80% of cabinets are live, so 80% of households can access broadband, but other areas—the 5% I have mentioned—are hard to reach.
Albert Owen
Do I get an extra minute if I give way, Madam Deputy Speaker? If so, I will give way.
Jake Berry
I draw hon. Members’ attention to my declaration of interest as a property owner on the island of Ynys Môn. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that an island such as Anglesey would be a perfect place to roll out mobile broadband, given that Holy Island, which is just off the coast, is relatively flat with some high points? Have the Welsh Government considered using the European money to roll out mobile broadband to get to those hard-to-reach properties?
Albert Owen
It is good that I get the extra minute, and the hon. Gentleman has also covered a couple of pages of my speech. I am happy to defend and fight for his interests and those of his parents on the island.
The serious point is that we want the £129 million clawback to be used properly. The Welsh Government have offered grants of £1,000 to the 5% of difficult areas, £900 of which the Welsh Government provide from that pot of money and £100 of which comes from the customers and community groups that want the wireless connection. I urge the Minister, who is a very reasonable person, to look at such things rather than have a summit because, with the greatest of respect, summits are about talking and what my constituents want is action.
My constituents do not want to be in the slow lane. They do not want to be on the periphery when it comes to 21st-century technologies. I would have liked to see pilots in rural areas. Smart metering for gas and electricity is the next big issue for the country, but the providers are already saying that they cannot reach 100% of households. I want my constituents and constituents in other rural and peripheral areas to be first-class citizens in this country. They must have not only the same rights and responsibilities, but the same services. Rural areas need to compete with large towns, so we need 21st-century infrastructure. Those who say that the market can deliver should look at the mobile phone coverage in my area. It is very poor and patchy, and the market is not delivering. We want all the main players to work together to ensure that rural and peripheral areas get 100% attention and 100% broadband and mobile coverage.
Mr Vaizey
The right hon. Gentleman cannot say that BT has me over a barrel when it has just paid back £129 million seven years early, thanks to the contracts we negotiated.
Let us look at those contracts. We said that we would deliver superfast broadband to 90% of homes and businesses in the country by the end of 2015. That is exactly what we will do. Three contracts have finished and 38 are ahead of schedule. I remind hon. Members that the reason BT bid for the contracts and that Virgin, for example, did not was that the state aid conditions required open access. Therefore, only companies that were prepared to see their networks used by their competitors were going to bid for the contracts. That is why BT was the only bidder in town.
Many of my hon. Friends have talked about Connecting Devon and Somerset, which did not sign a phase 2 contract with BT. I have sat in a room with hon. Friends and listened to officials from Devon and Somerset telling me that BT was not delivering. I now hear from my hon. Friends that BT is delivering.
As I have said, we have got £129 million back, thanks to the contracts. We are now going further. We have said that we will get to 95% of homes and businesses by the end of 2017. I am confident that we will deliver that as well. New technology and competition will help. Virgin has announced £3 billion of investment to compete with BT’s roll-out. It will get to 3 million to 4 million homes. Sky and TalkTalk are building a network in York to see how it can roll out fibre to premises.
That is a good example of how councils have to partner with telecoms providers, because they have to help with the planning. It is important that we keep the costs down. I hear people complain about the lack of broadband in central London, but Kensington and Chelsea refused to give planning permission to a single green box of BT’s for two years because it did not like the design. Councils have to get with it. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge) said, when we want to put up a mobile mast, we can suddenly find that the landowner has withdrawn their permission because of local objections. If we are going to build this infrastructure, there has to be a bit of give and take. Councils and local communities have to accept that the infrastructure has to be built. We might need to have taller masts and some structures in rural settings.
Now that BT has announced the roll-out of its G.fast technology, I am confident that 10 million homes will get speeds of 300 megabits or more over the next five years. We have the fastest roll-out and take-up of 4G in the world. We inherited a stalled auction programme from the last Labour Government that we had to resurrect and we are now back on track.
It was appalling to hear the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central say that we should have a policy like Australia’s, which is massively over budget and involved a huge legal battle over many years effectively to nationalise the main telecoms operator. That pretty much cost the last Labour Government in Australia the election. We will not go down that road—that is for sure.
My hon. Friends are, of course, interested in the remaining 5%. I have written to all hon. Members setting out where broadband has got to in their constituencies in the last quarter, how many homes are being connected and, importantly, how many homes are not being connected. I am prepared to sit down with all my hon. Friends and visit their constituencies over the next six months to discuss areas that are not getting broadband, so that we can work together to deliver it.
Albert Owen
The Minister echoes the success of the Welsh Government in delivering to my constituency because it was a partnership. Will he sit down with Welsh Government Ministers, and others, to see what best practice could be used so that England can follow in the tracks of Wales?
Mr Vaizey
As my hon. Friends will be aware, I should have singled out the hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) because a Labour Government in Wales are responsible for rolling out superfast broadband and—guess what?—according to the Labour party, superfast broadband is brilliant in Wales but terrible in England. I was interested to hear that the hon. Member for Stirling (Steven Paterson) could not make up his mind whether he wanted to condemn or support the roll-out of superfast broadband in Scotland by the Scottish Government and the SNP. I take all such critiques with a great pinch of salt.