Mobile Networks: Resilience

Baroness Finlay of Llandaff Excerpts
Tuesday 11th December 2018

(5 years, 10 months ago)

Lords Chamber
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Lord Ashton of Hyde Portrait Lord Ashton of Hyde
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Yes, power outages, pandemics and flood are some of the issues that the ECRRG, the group which I mentioned, has considered. It has improved the organisation for that in recent months.

Baroness Finlay of Llandaff Portrait Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)
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Is the Minister able to provide assurance that first responders and emergency services have a back-up system across all parts of the United Kingdom in the event of any of the systems going through an outage period?

Lord Ashton of Hyde Portrait Lord Ashton of Hyde
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I am not able to give that assurance as I do not know what bases the emergency services use. If, for example, they were entirely dependent on O2 they would not have back-up. I am not aware whether that is the case but I will certainly write to the noble Baroness on that subject.