Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 6th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I add my congratulations to my noble friend the Minister on so eloquently and effectively introducing the Bill. I, for one, will welcome anything that can improve connectivity, especially in rural areas. Not only is it a fact that local businesses are being held back from participating in and improving the rural economy, but there can also be safety aspects, particularly as regards mobile networks in rural areas where no phone boxes exist and there is a very poor mobile signal.

It is absolutely vital that a high standard of rural connectivity is achieved. Improving digital connectivity in rural areas will boost the rural economy and allow farmers to create jobs, improve their productivity and make full use of new technology to further reduce the environmental impact of food production. But, at the same time, the Government need to get the balance right between making it easier for telecommunications companies and operators to obtain the rights to acquire new sites for digital infrastructure, and to upgrade and share existing sites, and the rights of landowners. As a number of noble Lords have expressed this afternoon, this is an area where the infrastructure is largely borne in rural areas; we have to keep the landowners onside and ensure that the rights they currently enjoy are not reduced.

Will my noble friend therefore look at investigating why, when a number of telephone operators have put masts in very challenged areas of connectivity such as the North Yorkshire moors, these masts are not operational? That is surely extremely wasteful and frustrating, not just for the shareholders and those who have paid to have the masts put in place but even more so for the local residents who are unable to use them. I can give my noble friend and his department examples of this. Will he take this opportunity to investigate to make sure that this will stop immediately and that those masts will be put to good use straightaway in those areas that, he has accepted, are the remaining 5% hard to reach?

I pay tribute not just to my noble friend the Minister but to my noble friend Lord Vaizey, who was a star turn as a witness when I chaired the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee. I hope we did throw too many brickbats at him—he acquitted himself extremely well—but his evidence went to show how many obstacles still remain in place. I accept that the Bill is the next in line to improve those, but I thank my noble friend for taking the opportunity to share his expertise with us at that time. I will not go on to say what the fortunes of the chairmen of that Select Committee have turned to, given recent events since I left that position.

There are issues in the Bill that I will wish to explore as it progresses. One of those is the balance between operators and landowners that other noble Lords have alluded to this afternoon. Perhaps it has shifted too far in the interests of the former, to the detriment of the latter. I have heard that the interests of the consumer have been quoted. When the Government looked to introduce the 2017 Electronic Communications Code reforms, changing the way in which new sites were valued, they stipulated that landowners should be paid based on land value, not market value. The Law Commission at the time advised against that change, arguing that it would lead to a fall in rent for landowners and therefore a c in the number of agreements reached between landowners and operators to host digital infrastructure.

Its prediction was absolutely correct. Rents offered to landowners are up to 90% lower for new or renewal agreements made under the new 2017 valuation scheme. Before that code came into force, landowners assessed hosting mobile phone masts in the same way as they would other diversified activity. The rent to be received and terms of the agreement are carefully built into business models or other financial plans such as a pension or loan. For the most part, I would hazard a guess that this is affecting private, non-commercial landowners and farmers in a way that was simply not anticipated.

As the 2017 code has resulted in fewer new sites being agreed due to much lower rents being paid by operators, I urge my noble friend the Minister to look at this and not to bring further renewals under the new code, but to leave them under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954. I would certainly like to explore that as the Bill proceeds through this place. Has my noble friend received representations to this effect, and will he give us an undertaking this afternoon to address this as part of the passage of the Bill?

I would like to flag up to my noble friend another concern about why operators are not moving from calculating rent based on land value to market value, to which I just referred, and whether this will be the barrier to hosting future digital infrastructure on private land—a fear I share.

The Bill includes an alternative dispute resolution mechanism, which I welcome, but I ask my noble friend: why is using it optional for operators? Currently the Bill does not properly address the imbalance between the resources of operators—which seem to have limitless resources to contest a disagreement before the tribunal—and landowners, many of whom find resisting a claim before a tribunal simply beyond their means.

I end with my noble friend’s opening reference to the increasing existence of and potential for cyberattacks. I witnessed one in North Yorkshire on a company which, sadly, was not given any helping hand from the Government. It was advised not to pay a ransom but was told that if it did not pay the ransom, it probably would not have its systems back in place. Is there any opportunity through the Bill to extend more help to companies to ensure that any such future attacks will see more assistance offered to address the cyberattack and help companies get their systems back without paying a ransom? I think it ran into millions when it was the clothing company FatFace.

Many cyberattacks operate below the radar and do not enter the public domain for very good reason—because it is not good for business. Obviously, if a company is not insured before the cyberattack, it will certainly not get insurance after a cyberattack. I hope my noble friend will look favourably on a plea to ensure that more assistance is given, to prevent not only cyberattacks but the payment of ransoms when they happen.

I shall support the vast majority of the Bill, but I will be raising all these issues through it. I look forward to ensuring that my noble friend and his department will act as smartly as the devices we are hoping to use.