Telegraph Poles: Birmingham

Debate between Mark Garnier and Preet Kaur Gill

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Preet Kaur Gill]

The crux of the issue is that these companies are not exploring alternatives to poles or using existing infrastructure when they can. I will give some of many examples. Freedom of information requests to our local council revealed that Brsk did not need to put up poles on Clarendon Road in my constituency, because it could have utilised existing ducts—but it did so anyway, ignoring that fact. Vernon Road is another example; BT installed full-fibre to St Paul’s school for girls at that location without any requirement for poles, yet a constituent came to my surgery on Friday to tell me that another pole had gone up, with a notice on the council’s planning portal appearing only after the pole had been erected. That is even after the Minister’s meeting with Brsk.

I have met Brsk and exchanged exhaustive correspondence on these issues. What has struck me in my dealings with the firm is the lack of policy or strategy for work in my constituency. Poles are supposed to be a last resort, but even where they are not needed, like on Vernon Road, several go up anyway. There are now four on that road. Frequently, when issues are raised, they are not listened to. I asked Brsk for a map of where it is planning to roll out poles in my constituency, and it could not give me one. There is either a plan that it will not share or there really is no strategic focus on where the infrastructure is needed.

My constituents have had similar experiences. An elderly constituent wrote to me earlier this year, deeply worried that a Brsk telegraph pole on an adjoining road, installed less than a metre from her back garden fence, was so close that it could easily provide burglars with access to her property. She told me she lives in perpetual fear that her house could be broken into. More importantly, that was avoidable. Had Brsk simply made an effort to engage first with residents about changes in their community, she would not have been left in that situation.

[Mark Garnier (Wyre Forest) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Member for allowing me to intervene. She makes a powerful point on behalf of her constituents. In my constituency, we have a similar situation in Stourport-on-Severn, where firms are using permitted development rights in areas where residents are not even allowed to put up a garden fence because of planning approvals. Does she agree that it is a cynical attempt by many of these providers to build an infrastructure that provides capital value that can be sold on? That is less to do with delivering full-fibre broadband than with making money in the short term for those operators.

[Preet Kaur Gill]

I thank the hon. Member for that important point about the business model. There are alternative ways to implement the infrastructure. In areas like his, this activity does not respect the environment, heritage or planning laws, and we end up with poles erected. Some of them do not even have any lines going through them, which just goes to show that the existing infrastructure meant there was no need for that, but, as he says, it is clearly quite a lucrative business model to sell on the new infrastructure.