Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport

Chris Loder Excerpts

Wednesday 10th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Chris Loder (West Dorset) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I would like to thank the Minister and his colleagues very much for all the hard work they have been putting in so far.

It is brilliant news that the Government have allocated £5 billion to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. I am particularly pleased that we will be able to see firm action to deal with some of the many difficulties we have had with broadband connectivity in rural Britain, particularly in rural West Dorset. The average download speed in West Dorset is 42.5 megabits per second, which is a little under half of the UK average. I could quote many statistics like that, but I know full well that the Minister and his colleagues have heard from me frequently about this issue, in order that we make more progress. We are dealing with a legacy of many larger businesses in this sector taking the commercial opportunity of focusing on the highest yielding areas and therefore focusing on urban areas. In many cases, that has meant a loss to those living in not just rural areas, but very rural areas, who are often in that 1%, 2% or 3% of the population who really struggle to get decent broadband.

I am working with and supporting Dorset Council very much with its broadband fibre spine programme. We need £6.5 million to deliver that. Dorset Council works hard and saves hard, which is why we are in a position locally in Dorset to fund two thirds of that. Today, I am making a plea to the Minister and his colleagues: please help us find the remaining third. It is 0.05% of that £5 billion budget. It is £2.54 million, which we in Dorset would hugely appreciate, because that will give us the turbocharge we need to get our local businesses on track, and make sure that we in rural Dorset recover properly and fully from coronavirus, which is what we need. I very much encourage the Minister to do this. I stand ready, with my colleagues in rural Dorset, to support him in whatever way we can. A few months ago, I described his colleague, the Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness (Matt Warman), as the knight in shining armour that we are waiting for in Dorset. I very much hope that today’s Minister will be able to join the cavalry and make sure that we get that £2.5 million to sort out Dorset fibre broadband.