Rural Broadband (North Yorkshire)

Debate between Nigel Adams and Julian Smith

Wednesday 8th January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)]

Thank you, Mrs Main. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Julian Sturdy)—my constituency neighbour —on securing the debate. I also refer the Chair and hon. Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

I start by congratulating Superfast North Yorkshire, BT and the Government—for the cash—as we have made good progress in a relatively short space of time. With the project now halfway through and the target of 90% of homes having access to superfast broadband well down the track, the problem is that some villages will achieve only 2 megabits. They can see that that is the case and feel that they are being left in the slow lane. A constituency such as Selby and Ainsty faces real challenges. There are well over 100 villages. Many of them are on the border with other local authorities, where the exchange is across that border. Residents in villages such as Ryther, which currently has a 365 kilobit download speed, Newton Kyme, Catterton, Bickerton, Kirkby Overblow, Ulleskelf, Fairburn and many more have all expressed frustration at the pace of roll-out.

The problem appears to be the lack of a transparent plan to deliver the committed 2 megabits to the remaining 10%. The fact that the people who currently get the worst speeds have no visibility on when or whether they will be upgraded gives rise to considerable concern. I understand that Superfast North Yorkshire is about to leaflet every home in north Yorkshire to ensure that people are aware of the need to order the upgrade, because if they do not order it, they will not get it. Doing so might make the last 5% highly visible. It is now clear which areas are at risk of not being upgraded. They are the areas with the strongest support for the roll-out programme, because speeds are currently the lowest. They are also the areas that would have been the most supportive of the spending of the additional funds to upgrade the service. They might now be realising that they could see no improvement from that investment.

[Julian Smith]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, in addition to clarity on the 2 megabit issue that he so eloquently articulates, BT’s feet must be held to the fire with regard to the cabinets across north Yorkshire that it originally said were commercially viable? It now says that they are not, leaving communities such as Cononley in my constituency stuck between what they thought was going to be commercially viable and being outside the intervention area.

[Nigel Adams]

As usual, my hon. Friend is spot on. His remark leads quite nicely on to my next point. One of the features of the contract is that if take-up is high, money can be clawed back and then used to extend the project to further cabinets. For that reason, encouraging people to sign up for faster speeds is extremely important.

I take issue with something that my hon. Friend mentioned. Take-up has actually been relatively modest. Good areas typically have 25% to 30%. I am quite happy to be put right on that, but I am sure that take-up has been significantly less in other areas. That may be partly due to the lack of clarity about needing to place an order, which will hopefully be put right, or it might be that people who already have 10 megabits or more simply think that there is no need to upgrade to get 40 megabits.

Finally, the vision for this excellent project was to provide superfast broadband for 90% and at least 2 megabits to 10% and to revitalise rural economies. That vision generated support and enthusiasm for the project. Just because it is hard does not mean that we should be walking away from delivering something that was initially so enthusiastically received. In the next of my regular communications with Superfast North Yorkshire and BT, I hope to be given some comfort as to how the remaining 10% will be addressed.

Yorkshire (Tour de France)

Debate between Nigel Adams and Julian Smith

Tuesday 18th December 2012 Westminster Hall

[Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Gray, for calling me to speak.

It is a pleasure to take part in this debate. May I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon (Julian Smith) on having his crystal ball to hand when he applied for this debate? It is great news that one of the world’s greatest sporting events will be starting in our county in 2014.

When I first heard that Yorkshire was going to bid for the grand départ, I thought to myself, “Mais non! C’est pas possible!” However, I did not reckon on the guile, the craft and the salesmanship of Welcome to Yorkshire. Everyone at our tourism body deserves credit for winning the bid. We have singled out Gary Verity, who did a fantastic job leading the bid, but I would also like to mention Peter Dodd, who did a fantastic job supporting Gary along the way. They should be rightly proud of what they have done; they have turned a rank outsider into a winning bid, and they should be congratulated. Welcome to Yorkshire has a history of delivering success, winning the award for the world’s leading travel marketing campaign three years running and winning the award for Europe’s leading travel marketing campaign twice. It beat worldwide brands such as Expedia and Thomas Cook, tourism organisations such as Visit London, and countries such as Spain and Denmark.

It was only when I met Gary, Peter and their contacts from France to discuss the bid that I reckoned that Yorkshire had a serious chance of securing it. However, I was disappointed to receive a straight bat from the Government when I raised the prospect of supporting Yorkshire’s bid in the House before the summer. I was a little more disappointed that UK Sport did not appear to want to engage with the bid, not even with a supportive letter. Well, it looks like UK Sport backed the wrong horse.

The 5 and 6 July will be fantastic for the north of England, and particularly for Yorkshire, as Leeds will host the grand départ. Two stages of the Tour will need to go somewhere, and I hope the Amaury Sport Organisation, the race organiser, is listening to the debate; indeed, I am sure it is. I want briefly to make the case for part of the Tour to come to my area.

[Julian Smith]

In French.

[Nigel Adams]

I thought about giving the whole speech in French, but I decided, for reasons of expedience, to deliver it in English.

Selby has a fantastic cycling history. It also has links with France going back more than 950 years, and I will list a few. Members will be intrigued to hear that the town of Selby was founded by a French Benedictine monk—in fact, it was Benedict himself—in about 1067. The fourth son of William the Conqueror, who was French, of course, would go on to become King Henry I, and he was born in Selby, becoming the only English-born Norman monarch. Selby abbey’s patron saint is St Germain, who was based in Auxerre, and evidence suggests he visited Selby.

[Julian Smith]

Was St Germain a cyclist?

[Nigel Adams]

I do not believe he cycled, but the name of Garmancarr lane, which is in the village of Wistow, is a corruption of Germain’s carr. As I am sure my hon. Friend is aware, carr means low-lying washland. The lane’s name therefore suggests that St Germain held land in the Selby area.

The scientist Smithson Tennant was assisted in discovering two chemical elements in 1804 by two French chemists. Cochrane’s shipyard built many of the ships and supplied some of the barge men for the D-day landings, which made the liberation of France possible—mind you, we also built the ships that helped us defeat the French at Agincourt.

Employment Law (Businesses)

Debate between Nigel Adams and Julian Smith

Wednesday 3rd November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Julian Smith]

I thank my hon. Friend for those comments. It is not just small companies that are affected: the cumulative effect of the measures is also significant for bigger businesses. Before I came to the House I was a head-hunter who worked with some of the biggest companies in the world. I saw how easy it was to put a senior employee in an international location rather than in the UK. I have a long list of examples whereby, when it came to choosing between London, New York or Asia, London came last. The cost of managing and getting rid of staff often tipped the balance in favour of another location. That just happens without fanfare or fuss, and that is why, like our tax and immigration policies, our employment policy must be ruthlessly competitive. The competition that the UK faces is becoming intense. Over the next few years we desperately need people to take the risk, set up businesses, invest in existing ones and create jobs here in Britain.

Labour increased its depressing legacy of employment law in its dying days, with measures on agency workers, the Equalities Act 2010 and additional paternity leave. Each measure will have a major effect on British business. For example, the new dual discrimination laws, with limitless liability, mean that employers will have to focus even more on protecting themselves, and, with discrimination law changing so often and widening to include more and more employees, is it any wonder that entrepreneurs fear taking on their first member of staff?

[Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)]

I concur entirely with what has been said. Like many others now in the Chamber, I ran a small business for a number of years, but employment legislation is not the only thing holding back small businesses. In North Yorkshire, as my hon. Friend will be aware, the county council has stopped traders placing advertising boards outside their premises. We have just been through—