Broadband Universal Service Obligation

Debate between Geoffrey Clifton-Brown and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 15th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. The rural superfast broadband programme has been a great success. It has delivered access to superfast broadband to almost 5 million homes. The money invested by Government will be paid back because of the nature of the contracts. The hon. Member for Wrexham mentioned that he had persuaded Virgin to come to his constituency. Virgin is now investing £3 billion in extending its network, and that is partly inspired by the success of the superfast broadband network.

The point I really want to make is that I am sick and tired of people talking down this country and pretending that we are in some kind of digital desert. The latest culprit—I am astonished that the Government allowed this to happen—is Lord Adonis, a Labour peer—[Interruption.] No longer a Labour peer. Alright, he is an ex-Labour peer, but we know where his sentiments lie. He used the platform of the National Infrastructure Commission to publish a report yesterday claiming that we have worse mobile broadband than Peru. He based that on one set of analysis by Open Signal. I am not denigrating that company, but it relies on people downloading an app and then uploading the speed they are getting. Some 4,500 in Peru use the Open Signal app, and most respectable telecoms analysts would not go near a country unless they had data from at least 25,000 users. One of the mobile companies in Peru does not even provide 4G, but that is not even mentioned in the Open Signal app.

It is much better to look at a company such as Akamai, which points out that we have the fastest download speed in 4G of any country in Europe. It is almost double the next best in the EU five. Its report, which was published this week, says:

“the United Kingdom once again had the fastest average mobile connection speed at 23.7 Mbps (up from 23.1 Mbps in the second quarter)”.

We have between 82% and 93% household coverage for 4G. A total of 76% of mobile subscribers in this country have 4G subscriptions. That is double the next best country, which is Germany, at around 35%. We have companies such as Amazon investing in cloud services. We lead the world in e-commerce. If we are this so-called “digital desert”, as Lord Adonis claimed today to promote his report, how come we lead on all these metrics? I urge my right hon. Friend the Minister to give Lord Adonis a dressing down, and to tell him to check his facts and use a better analysis instead of running around promoting his report, pretending that we somehow live in a digital desert.

[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown]

As it happens, I have the Akamai table here on my machine. Whereas the UK has a score of 13 for international connections, Peru has a score of only 4.4. How Lord Adonis can come up with his figures, I do not know.

[Mr Vaizey]

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend.

Apart from the dressing down of Lord Adonis at the Bar of the House of Commons, my main policy point is this—[Interruption.] I tried as a Minister to get a comprehensive data analysis of broadband connections, because too many independent reports are knocking about that people can use to make their own partisan points. We need Ofcom to collate these reports and to update its data, because its own data—not through its own fault but because of how long it takes to collect them—are often six months to a year out of date. We need one comprehensive UK digital report published every year by Ofcom, incorporating all the independent research.

I took refuge in the absolutely excellent independent analysis undertaken by thinkbroadband. If any hon. Members want to know how many connections they have in their constituency, they should go to the thinkbroadband website where they will get the most up-to-date and accurate information.

Having attacked Lord Adonis without his having the chance to defend himself, let me say that I thought his report was excellent, despite his pathetic attempt to promote it by putting out misleading analysis of the digital position in this country. The recommendations were spot-on, not least the recommendation that my right hon. Friend the Minister’s empire should be expanded. I tried to expand my empire when I was a Minister and I failed dismally. People will not be surprised to hear that, but my right hon. Friend is 10 times more talented and 10 times more superfast, and it is right that under his stewardship we should bring together all digital projects.

It is a scandal that we do not have broadband in trains. The reason is that that area is run by the Department for Transport and Network Rail, whereas it should be run by my right hon. Friend. It is a scandal that the Home Office is in charge of the emergency services network; it should be run by him. It is a scandal that we do not have coverage on our roads; it should be run by him. All these digital projects should be brought under one Minister, and I cannot think of anyone more talented than my right hon. Friend.

I come now to the third recommendation. We have something called Broadband Delivery UK—BDUK. The clue is in the title: the D is for delivery. Under my right hon. Friend the Minister, who is talented enough to oversee a large organisation such as that, Broadband Delivery UK should be turned into a delivery organisation that works with local councils. It should not be left to the hon. Member for Wrexham to browbeat Virgin Media to deliver broadband to his constituency; BDUK should be working with Virgin, Openreach and all the mobile operators.

Many of the problems that make us gnash our teeth and pull our hair out are down to appalling planning procedures. We all know the story of how Kensington and Chelsea would not allow BT to upgrade its network because it did not like the design of the green boxes. I have had rows with council leaders in south London who just did not like the people at Openreach and so were not prepared to move. I had telecoms companies coming to me saying that they wanted to deliver broadband to council houses but could get a wayleave from the council to do it. So much of this is about bad planning and straightforward bureaucracy.

Library Services

Debate between Geoffrey Clifton-Brown and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Tuesday 25th January 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Vaizey]

I will finish my opening remarks.

[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Vaizey]

I will give way to my hon. Friend.

--- Later in debate ---

[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown]

The hon. Lady has had a chance to speak. I have been sitting here, but I have not had a chance to speak. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Minister on the way in which he is approaching the subject, but I tell him that Gloucestershire has received the worst local authority settlement in the country. Seven of the eight libraries in my area face the prospect of being cut to volunteer-only services. Will my hon. Friend’s officials work with Gloucestershire county council to make sure that it is given every possible support? Even a volunteer library requires seed corn to keep it going. Incidentally, this is not only about libraries being cut to volunteer services, because Gloucestershire’s mobile library service is being cut altogether.

[Mr Vaizey]

I will certainly give my hon. Friend that commitment. I will explain exactly what the Government are doing in a minute. First, however, given that this is all politics, let me perhaps correct some of the impressions given by Opposition Members. The hon. Member for Wigan opened by saying that libraries in her local authority had no future.