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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what plans her Department has to spend the remaining £3.8 billion of Project Gigabit funding.

Project Gigabit is a £5 billion programme to deliver gigabit connectivity. £1.2 billion was allocated to Project Gigabit in this Spending Review period, with the remainder available in future years.

Through Project Gigabit we are contracting with suppliers to install gigabit-capable broadband networks to hard-to-reach areas of the UK. These contracts will deliver gigabit connectivity in this Spending Review period and beyond. We recently signed our first Project Gigabit contracts in North Dorset and Teesdale, and have launched procurements with a value of over £700 million to date.