Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps his Department is taking to increase the reliability of infrastructure for 5G connectivity in London.

The government wants all areas of the UK, including London, to benefit from reliable and high-quality mobile coverage, and this is reflected in our ambition for all populated areas to have higher quality standalone 5G by 2030.

The department continues to work closely with the mobile network operators to deliver on this ambition, including removing barriers to deployment where they exist. This includes launching a call for evidence as soon as possible to assess the merits of planning reform to support the deployment of mobile infrastructure.

Through the Electronic Response and Resilience Group, DSIT works in partnership with communications providers to promote resilience across the sector.

The Telecommunications (Security) Act 2021 amended the Communications Act 2003 to place new security duties on telecoms providers to identify, reduce, and prepare for the risks of security compromises in public telecoms networks or services and to remedy or mitigate their adverse effects. These obligations are overseen by Ofcom, who have powers to enforce compliance. Ofcom publish information on security and resilience of networks in their annual Connected Nations UK Report.

In December 2023, Ofcom launched a public Call for Input on the power back-up at mobile network access sites across the UK. They published an update on their work in February this year, confirming they are completing further analysis to determine the appropriate and proportionate measures that mobile operators should put in place.