Telecommunications Infrastructure (Leasehold Property) Bill

Lord Fox Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 2nd June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I will be extremely brief. I hope that the Minister will understand entirely the reason for this probing amendment. It arises from the way in which the compensation clause—new paragraph 27H—is worded. It seems to give enormous licence to award compensation under the terms of the Electronic Communications Code where a court has made a Part 4A order. That has been imposed, of course, but new paragraph 27H(2) states that:

“The court may, on the application of the required grantor, order the operator to pay compensation to the required grantor for any loss or damage that has been sustained or will be sustained by the required grantor as a result of the exercise by the operator of the Part 4A code right.”


I am concerned that these compensation requirements are drawn so widely so they could be a disincentive to an operator to lay fibre to a home or MDU as envisaged by this new section of the Electronic Communications Code.

What kind of compensation is contemplated in these circumstances? I have inserted “direct” because in law it is perfectly respectable to claim damages for foreseeable loss. That could mean economic loss—for instance, where a Part 4A agreement has been imposed and somebody loses two days’ worth of business or finds that they have to close unexpectedly a particular facility that is part of the building to which the order relates. Then there is ancillary land, where the landlord has some other kind of business next door to the MDU and it is necessary for the fibre to cross it or be laid across it by the operator, meaning closure and so on. What is contemplated? It seems extraordinarily wide-ranging. Of course, it provides for arbitration and agreement to be reached, but I want very much to hear from the Minister exactly what is contemplated by this clause. As I say, it is so widely drawn that it could be seen as a disincentive to the operators, which we all wish to see move pretty swiftly to ensure that the Government’s target for full fibre rollout is met. I beg to move.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

I thank my noble friend Lord Clement- Jones for setting out this amendment so effectively. He promised to be brief; I will be even briefer. Is this not symptomatic of the whole Bill, where the balance is against things happening rather than for making things happen? What was in the Government’s mind when they wrote this clause and put this Bill together? Is this an enabling Bill or a sort of grudging Bill that somehow lets a few things happen but ends up stopping a lot of other things? Why did the Government take this kind of attitude, which is symptomatic of the whole Bill?

[Lord Adonis (Lab)]

Am I coming through loud and clear? I suddenly have the Throne as my picture on the screen. Should I be worried?

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Lord Fox]

21: After Clause 2, insert the following new Clause—
“Review of this Act's impact on 1 gigabit broadband accessibility
(1) Within six months of the passing of this Act, the Secretary of State must lay before Parliament a review of the impact of this Act on the Government’s progress towards achieving access to 1 gigabit per second broadband in every premises in the United Kingdom by 2025.(2) The review must make a recommendation as to whether the Government should bring forward further legislation to achieve access to 1 gigabit per second broadband in every premises in the United Kingdom by 2025 in light of the findings of the review.(3) The Secretary of State must lay before Parliament a further review in the same terms as subsection (1) every 12 months after the initial review has been laid.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require the Government to review the impact of this Bill in achieving access to 1 gigabit per second broadband in every premises in the UK by 2025.

[Lord Fox]

My Lords, given the peculiar nature of this debate, I have not made a Second Reading speech. Much of what I wanted to say at Second Reading coincides with what I wish to say on Amendment 21, so I decided to save your Lordships from a double helping. I propose to make a couple of short Second Reading-type comments, and then I will turn to Amendment 21 and refer to Amendment 22.

Before ever the Bill reached our end, like other noble Lords I received a letter from the Minister. It spelled out that the Bill has a specific and relatively narrow purpose and we should not be tempted to open it out. The noble Baroness, Lady Falkner of Margravine, and the noble Lord, Lord Alton, introduced amendments that sought to open things out. I do not propose to repeat their arguments here although, looking at the speakers’ list, there may be some who do. However, since that first day in Committee, the Government seem to have changed their position on technology. Can the Minister update us on what security reviews are now under way within Her Majesty’s Government? When will your Lordships’ House be presented with the result of those security reviews? To that end, when will the telecoms security Bill be introduced?

On the first day in Committee there were a number of speeches from all sides of the House about the need for an industrial strategy, and I associate myself with them. Her Majesty’s Government have considerable leverage, given their huge investment in this endeavour, and they should use that leverage to help develop indigenous capability and capacity in a similar way to how my right honourable friend Sir Edward Davey, when he was Energy Secretary, leveraged the development of offshore wind technology to create an industry, particularly in the north of England. We should ensure that operators and tier-one suppliers develop significant UK-based technology and manufacturing. It seems that there are talks along these lines going on within government, so can the Minister clarify who the Government are speaking with about telecoms technology and industrial strategy and how this will be presented to Parliament?

In short, we need a Bill that brings back all these issues—security, human rights, which were raised by the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and industrial strategy—because for the UK to get the connectivity it deserves and needs, the decision must be made now and quickly. This is not a matter of mild curiosity for Members; it is vital information for security providers. They need to know where they are before they can get on with connecting the United Kingdom.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)]

As no further Members have indicated that they wish to speak, I call the noble Lord, Lord Fox.

[Lord Fox]

I thank the Minister for his comprehensive response, which I will come to in a minute. I also thank all noble Lords for their response to the debate; it has been an interesting one, which has very much given evidence of the fact that we need a much wider Bill and a much wider level of discussion across the piece, whether we agree or otherwise.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, for introducing at the beginning the lies and sleights of advertising. To be clear, if someone is offering 1 gigabit and you are getting only 750 megabits down the line, that is a lot better than what I am getting now. To some extent, the bigger the target, the closer we get to what we need.

There is another issue, to do with empowerment, which none of us talked about: upload speeds. Noble Lords did talk about issues in rural areas, however. We heard voices from west Cumbria, Wales and Northern Ireland—and here I will of course play my Herefordshire card. For businesses to be empowered, and to plug into the recovery of our economy, they need to be able to upload, because that is how they sell things to other people and make money.

As the noble Lords, Lord Blunkett, Lord Bhatia and Lord Liddle, said, this is about equality and fairness. As a Parliament, we must stand up for the people who have the very worst delivery. The noble Lord, Lord Adonis, introduced the idea of the USO, and the Minister responded. We have a USO of 10 megabits, but compare that to the postal service. We have only a first and second-class postal system, but a fifth-class stamp would be needed to reproduce the levels of service in some parts of the areas I have just described. So I say yes to a USO, but it has to be a USO that really delivers.

The noble Lord, Lord Empey, also introduced some industrial nostalgia, which I sign up to. But in this context, I add Plessey, GEC and Marconi. Where are they when we need them? The answer is that we did not have an industrial strategy when we needed it. We have to recover ground on some of those issues.

The noble Baroness, Lady Falkner of Margravine, seemed to sign up to the Government’s target of 2025 but then pushed out for six months, on the basis that it was too soon. The longer she leaves it, the more it becomes a self-defeating exercise, because 2025 is coming over the hill. We talked about rural, but it is not just rural. The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, and others raised the issue of multioccupancy and the large proportion of the urban poor who need access to get the equality referred to by the noble Lords, Lord Blunkett and Lord Bhatia.

I have one response to the Minister’s overall Second Reading comments. I am pleased that he reaffirmed 2025 and talked about the £5 billion investment programme. That underlines the Government’s leverage in this area, which should be used to the overall advantage of the United Kingdom and not sold off to the cheapest bidders. We have to look at that.

In his response to Amendment 21, the Minister said that it addressed a specific issue. It is so narrow in its ambition that it actually addresses a specific issue within a specific issue. The point made forcefully and helpfully by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson—for which I thank him—is that the operators are not dancing down the street in response to this measure. They are all saying that it misses a trick; it misses an opportunity. Between now and Report, if the Government have a chance to go back and talk to those operators and listen, as they say they are doing, they will hear that there is a lot more to do. The Minister seems to be hiding behind Ofcom. It is the Government’s job to lead—to direct and point the direction of this policy. This point was made forcefully and ably by the noble Lord, Lord Liddle. My argument is not with Ofcom: it is with the Government’s lack of leadership. To push Ofcom in front of the Government is to use it as something of a human shield, whereas it is the Government who have to push this and deliver it. I am sure Ofcom would be fully able to support that.

My final point is about inconsistencies. This seems incredibly well confected. Well done to the Government, because my amendment says “access”. It does not say that there has to be a pipe and it does not say that there cannot be 5G. “Access” is a technology-neutral word. If the Minister has a problem with that and wants to use a word that the department feels is more consistent with existing legislation, I am sure we are all big enough to take that on. On Amendment 22, does it seem so scary for the Government to switch to the affirmative approach? I shall leave that where it lies.

In conclusion, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, for introducing the idea of the Government’s planned “raft” of legislation. At best, this is a plank, and these amendments seek to varnish it a bit. We need a lot more evidence of the Government’s legislative determination to deliver on their goal. We will look closely at the Government’s response on Report. Listening to other Members and the outside world, I think it is clear that the Government have got the tone of the Bill wrong. That said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 21 withdrawn.