Copper Wire Telecoms

John Whittingdale Excerpts

Wednesday 13th December 2023 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Data and Digital Infrastructure (Sir John Whittingdale)]

I share the pleasure of the Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Rhondda (Sir Chris Bryant), in seeing you in the Chair this morning, Mr Mundell. Let me start by congratulating the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) on securing this debate on a very important issue, and I am grateful to all those who have contributed and made some important points. The debate has ranged far and wide; we have encompassed the subject of the debate taking place this afternoon in this place, and indeed the debate in the Chamber tomorrow afternoon. This has been a good rehearsal of some of the issues.

This country is on a journey towards a digital economy. The Government have set an ambition that we should be one of the most technologically advanced economies in the world, and we are transitioning very rapidly away from the old analogue past through the roll-out of gigabit broadband. Indeed, I suspect that this afternoon the Government will be pressed to go further on that. We are making real progress, and we will report the latest figures for Project Gigabit on Friday morning. I was delighted to visit the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) not long ago, when we peered into a broadband cabinet in Orford.

As we move towards the most modern technology, we leave behind the infrastructure of the past, which includes the eventual closure of the analogue telephone network. The Opposition spokesman pointed out that it is perhaps not universally known as the PSTN, but it is a term that people will become more familiar with. It represents ageing technology—the first automated exchange was invented in the late 19th century, and the analogue network as we know it has existed since the 1980s. It has done a great job for us, but it is not fit for purpose today. As a result, it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain: spare parts are difficult to find, the number of outages is increasing and the engineers who work on it are retiring. Not moving away from that to a more modern, resilient network would in itself create risk. The question is how we accomplish the change in a way that is secure, efficient and protects those who still rely on the PSTN network for connectivity. It is vital for Government, industry and Ofcom to work together to make sure the transition is achieved successfully.

As has been recognised by several speakers, the process was decided and initiated by the telecoms industry. The Government did not ask it to do so, nor have they determined the timelines or parameters for the switch-off. However, as the hon. Member for Rhondda points out, the Government have a responsibility to ensure the protection of all citizens, so they and Ofcom are working together to monitor the progress of the migration.

We have a particular interest in the groups in society who rely on their landline the most and might find it difficult to migrate to a new technology. They will include elderly citizens, people with mental or physical impairments or those who suffer from other vulnerabilities. We looked for very strong assurances that the needs of those people would be recognised and protected during any migration that took place.

Despite the assurances that we were given by communications operators, we have recently become aware of serious incidents of telecare users finding that their devices have failed when trying to activate them. That is completely unacceptable. The safety of vulnerable people has to be our top priority. As soon as we learned of those incidents, the Secretary of State and I met the relevant communication provider and requested that it carry out an urgent investigation to identify all vulnerable customers and make sure that their devices are fully operable.

In addition, we have asked the companies to pause forced migrations from PSTN networks and have asked Ofcom what more it can do to monitor the migration process. We have invited all communications providers to attend a roundtable tomorrow to ask them to sign up to a charter of commitments to protect vulnerable consumers through the transition. That will cover the need to protect vulnerable consumers—particularly telecare users—as well as the need to go further than Ofcom guidance on power resilience for the most vulnerable consumers and to agree a cross-sector definition of vulnerability.

I have also had meetings in the last 24 hours with Ministers from the Department of Health and Social Care and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities to discuss what more can be done to protect vulnerable consumers and to facilitate data sharing between local authorities, telecoms firms and telecare providers so that we can locate every single one of the people reliant on those devices.

[Sir Chris Bryant]

The Minister might want to speak to the devolved Administrations as well, because many of those responsibilities are devolved.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir John Whittingdale]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, and we will do that. Existing telecare devices already in the system need to be digitally compatible, and we are talking urgently to the Department of Health and Social Care about that. I take his point that we need to make sure that all four nations of the UK receive the same information and can give the same assurances.

Consumers can feel confident about the migration only if they understand how the change will impact on them. They need to know what additional support is available to them. That is particularly important for vulnerable consumers. Although the PSTN network is due to be switched off in full by 2025, the approach to migrate customers off the network varies from one provider to another.

Turning to the issue that the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland raised in his opening contribution, network resilience is of particular importance. Telecom is vital critical national infrastructure, and that is never more true than when it is providing a literal lifeline to vulnerable citizens. That is why we have always placed such emphasis on network security and resilience, and why we introduced the Telecommunications (Security) Act 2021. We published the UK Government resilience framework in December 2022, and the Deputy Prime Minister recently issued the first update to it.

With the PSTN network switch-off, it is vital that operators continue to prioritise resilience and make special arrangements for their vulnerable customers. The power sector takes important action to protect its customers and to ensure that the correct support is given to the most vulnerable customers during power disruptions, including those who are disabled and reliant on electric power devices. Electricity distribution network operators are obliged to maintain a priority services register.

Separately, since 2018 Ofcom has issued guidance to operators to ensure the sector remains resilient to all risks that may affect services. It states that, in the event of a power outage, providers should have at least one telecoms solution available that enables access to emergency organisations for a minimum of one hour. The solution should be suitable for customers’ needs and should be offered free of charge to those who are at risk. In line with that guidance, fixed-line providers offer back-up battery equipment for the required one-hour minimum, and in many cases battery back-up lasts much longer.

Several Members raised the concern that one hour is insufficient. Obviously, we face more violent weather events and potentially greater power outages, so we will keep that under review, and we are asking Ofcom to look at it again. We have never suffered a nationwide loss of power services, and major outages are still quite rare. If we experience a network outage, there are strong response mechanisms in place across all the operators to ensure services can be restored as quickly as possible. Where telecoms services have experienced disruptions, generally caused by severe weather, typically they resume immediately on power restoration.

Distribution network operators are also required to liaise with local authorities, strategic co-ordinating groups and local resilience forums and partnerships, to share information about vulnerable customers and provide welfare support by working together, but we recognise that we need to do more. That is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State wrote to Ofcom last year to request a wider review of telecoms resilience, and to ask whether more can be done to improve the sector’s power resilience. Ofcom has provided new resilience guidelines for communications providers on the measures they are expected to take in relation to the resilience of their networks, as part of their security duties under the 2021 Act. That includes specific measures for electrical power back-up required in fixed-line networks.

The Ofcom consultation on resilience guidance was published last week and is due to close on 1 March. It proposes updating the resilience guidance, including ensuring that networks are designed to avoid or reduce single points of failure; ensuring key infrastructure points have automatic failover functionality built in so that traffic is immediately diverted to another device or site when equipment fails; and setting out the processes, tools and training that should be considered to support the resilience requirements. Throughout the consultation, Ofcom is also inviting stakeholder input on the question of mobile resilience, asking what services consumers should be able to expect during a power outage and what a more cost-effective solution may look like.

It is important to recognise that power resilience is not just important in the context of the withdrawal of the copper network; it is essential to the functioning of all communications networks, including the mobile phone network. Comment has been made about the fact that mobile coverage is still not as great as we would like it to be. The wireless infrastructure strategy sets out a route to extending mobile coverage, and the shared rural network is helping to deliver that. I recognise the complaints that Ofcom’s assessment of the current mobile network coverage does not match the everyday experience of most hon. Members—including myself, I might say. We have asked Ofcom to look at that urgently to try to improve the accuracy of existing mobile coverage statistics. We will continue to prioritise power resilience issues for fixed and mobile networks across the country, working closely with the industry and the power sector. The Government are continuing to work with Ofcom to understand what may be considered appropriate and proportionate as an outcome of the consultation.

It is important that we have telecoms networks that are fit for the modern age. It is right that the technology that underpins the network is updated both now and in future, so that it can keep pace with all the demand that we place on it—from the digital economy, to social connections and contacting the emergency services. It is important that the network is fit for purpose, secure and resilient. In modernising the network, it is also important that communications providers work closely with their customers—especially the most vulnerable—to understand their needs.

It is right that the industry should seek to switch off the PSTN but, in doing so, companies should ensure that the transition is secure and efficient, and that they protect those who rely on the PSTN for their connectivity. As I have said, we remain extremely concerned that some of the understanding and assurance that we had about the protections being put in place appear not to have been fully delivered. For that reason, the Government are acting urgently to consult both Ofcom and all the communications providers to put in place absolute assurances, so that we can guarantee to the public that the transition will be conducted safely.