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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if she will publish details of (a) planned changes to the Communications Code; and whether that will include mitigations to help ensure that telecoms companies cannot demand rent reductions from landowners for mast infrastructure.

Our consultation on Electronic Communications Code closed on 24 March 2021, and we are analysing the responses received. The government’s response will be published once this process is completed.

The consultation made clear that the government continues to believe the valuation regime introduced in 2017 strikes the right balance between the public need for digital communications and the rights of landowners to receive fair payments for allowing their land to be used. The valuation regime is therefore not being revisited, but the consultation did ask whether changes were needed to support more collaborative negotiations and help disagreements to be dealt with more quickly and cheaply.