Oral Answers to Questions

John Howell Excerpts

Thursday 14th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Eric Ollerenshaw (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Con)]

6. What recent progress he has made on his plans to ensure the UK has the best superfast broadband network in Europe.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

7. What recent progress he has made on his plans to ensure the UK has the best superfast broadband network in Europe.

[Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

13. What recent progress he has made on his plans to ensure the UK has the best superfast broadband network in Europe.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hunt]

We are specifically trying to set up a scheme so that, where people raise their own funds to solve broadband problems, it is possible to integrate that into the national network. Our objective is to enable as much local self-help work as possible, so I welcome my hon. Friend’s initiative and those taken by his constituents.

[John Howell]

Large parts of my constituency suffer from rural broadband poverty, but at an official level it is often masked because neighbouring Oxford has good broadband, and the level at which it is integrated is too great to show that granularity. What advice can my right hon. Friend give about making sure that those areas of rural broadband poverty in my constituency are recognised?

[Mr Hunt]

The comfort that I can give my hon. Friend is that our ambition, which is vastly higher than anything that we had from Labour, is that by 2015 90% of the country will have access to superfast broadband. However, it will not stop there, because we will have a plan in place for the other 10% which means that they will have a very good prospect of getting superfast broadband. In many cases—for example, in my own county of Surrey—plans are being put forward whereby there will be 100% access to superfast broadband by 2014. Good local authorities are thinking about the other 10% and making sure that they are not left behind, and we are doing everything we can to help them.