Oral Answers to Questions

Luke Hall Excerpts

Thursday 22nd March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Of course I congratulate those who win that Twitter competition, but the hon. Lady raises a serious point. We are already taking action, both through the Data Protection Bill, which will protect children online, and more broadly through the internet safety strategy. I pay tribute to Baroness Kidron and other peers who have put a huge amount of effort into getting the details of the Bill right. We continue to work with them to make sure that we do everything we can to make Britain the safest place to be online.

[Luke Hall (Thornbury and Yate) (Con)]

T2. South Gloucestershire Council’s broadband roll-out scheme has been hugely successful so far. It has brought connection up from 61% to 92% in just four years. With fibre- to-the-premises technology being required to connect the remaining households, what more support can the Department give to make sure that rural communities are not left behind?

[The Minister of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Margot James)]

As I said earlier, we have changed the national planning policy framework, we have a £30 million rural development programme with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to improve connectivity, and we have a broadband voucher scheme that will provide subsidy for small and medium-sized enterprises and for communities, so that they can connect in an ultrafast way.