Oral Answers to Questions

Patrick Hurley Excerpts

Wednesday 25th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

My hon. Friend makes a strong point: we need digital inclusion for every community. If we are going to have a digital Government, we need to have a digital nation, and we cannot have some people excluded from that future. That is why we have announced £6 million in this financial year for the innovation fund, and I hope that local authorities will come forward with innovative ideas on how we can break down the barriers to digital inclusion.

[Patrick Hurley (Southport) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Minister for Data Protection and Telecoms (Chris Bryant)]

The Department is determined to make the UK the best place in the world for science and technology. Last week, the spending review committed £86 billion to research and development, enabling every aspect of our tech economy to start firing on all cylinders. Building on that, we published the digital and technology sector plan as part of our modern industrial strategy on Monday, backing our innovators in fields like quantum, life sciences and engineering biology with over £1 billion.

[Patrick Hurley]

Across the northern part of my constituency, from Marshside over to Hesketh Bank—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Members are not meant to walk in front of the Member who is speaking; it is discourteous. The hon. Member for Portsmouth North (Amanda Martin) deliberately looked and carried on.

[Patrick Hurley]

The mobile phone signal is uniformly terrible across the northern part of my constituency, meaning that my constituents are missing out on opportunities. Will the Minister work more closely with industry to identify and deal with those rural mobile blackspots to further the Government’s growth mission?