Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment his Department has made of the potential economic benefits of the Shared Rural Network for (a) Morley and Outwood constituency and (b) West Yorkshire.

The focus of the world leading Shared Rural Network (SRN) programme is on improving connectivity in the more rural areas of the UK and not urban towns and cities. The SRN will see coverage in the region of Yorkshire and The Humber improve to 90% from 81% from all four mobile network operators, with coverage from at least one operator improving to 99% from 95%. This will allow rural businesses to improve operations and exploit the full potential of the internet across a range of sectors, levelling up the digital divide between urban and rural areas.