UK Telecommunications Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
Carol Monaghan
Main Page: Carol Monaghan (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North West)Department Debates - View all Carol Monaghan's debates with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
(3 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Oliver Dowden
As my hon. Friend will be aware, the US and Australia have already taken such decisions, the Canadians have a similar analysis to us but have yet to take a decision on it, and New Zealand has a slightly different process. Each country around the world is looking at how best to protect its telecoms networks, but also—crucially—how to develop its own domestic alternatives. The way to address that is by working co-operatively such as through open RAN.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP) [V]
In January, the Government announced that Huawei would be limited to 35% of the network but crucially not be in its core. While I welcome the U-turn, I must point out that Huawei is already in the core of EE’s 4G network—5G, of course, is layered on top—and BT has said that it will take years to remove it. How will the Secretary of State mitigate the risk posed by Huawei’s continued presence in the core of EE’s network?
Oliver Dowden
The first point is that all that equipment will have been approved by the Huawei cell in GCHQ. In addition, that is why we introduced the ban on Huawei from the core, and we have now set out the path down to zero.