Question

To ask the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington, representing the House of Commons Commission, what the average broadband download speed is on the Parliamentary estate.

The Parliamentary Estate provides users with a number of different broadband solutions with varying bandwidth based on usage and capacity requirements. These are listed below:

• Parliament’s main secure private network (PN) resilient internet connection = 2Gbps bandwidth
• The secure ‘internet direct’ resilient wireless service = 400Mbps bandwidth
• Broadband over a phone line = 5–7Mbps bandwidth

The Digital Service takes action where possible to improve the broadband download speed across the Parliamentary Estate. However, due to the age and condition of the Palace of Westminster it is difficult to improve both the wiring that is available and to supplement the wireless connectivity.

The average download speeds on these services will vary as it depends on a number of factors such as the capability of the user’s device, the connection type (wired/wireless), the size of download, the current bandwidth utilisation on any given day and the volume of users/devices connected, as these internet services and bandwidths are shared with all users across the Parliamentary estate. Due to these factors, the Digital Service does not hold data relating to the average download speed.