Digital Understanding

Earl Cathcart Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2017 Lords Chamber

[Earl Cathcart (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness’s Motion is excellent for those who receive adequate broadband speed. For those who do not, it is meaningless. In answer to my recent Written Question on poor broadband speeds, the Minister said that in this Parliament, the universal service obligation would give “everyone” a “legal right” to request 10 megabits per second. He also said:

“All homes and businesses can now gain access to broadband speeds of 2 Megabits”.


That is just not true. In spite of me and my fellow parishioners constantly asking BT and Openreach for better speeds, nothing ever happens. Our speeds are woefully poor to non-existent, as my noble friend Lord Ashton found out when he stayed with me in Norfolk this summer. He tested our speed and found it was a mere 0.3 megabits per second, which was nowhere near the promised 2 megabits he assured us we had in his written reply.

So where do the Government get their information, which is quite clearly so inaccurate, from? Could it be from Ofcom, which acknowledges that,

“many homes and small businesses still are unable to receive broadband speeds that are adequate to reliably perform a range of common online activities. Almost a quarter of a million UK premises … cannot get a download speed of more than 2Mbit/s.”?

A quarter of a million premises might just about be right for rural Norfolk—I bet the figure is far higher for the whole country. So where has Ofcom got its figures from? It certainly has not visited my home, as my noble friend did, or it too might have discovered a speed of only 0.3 megabits, which is worse than many third world countries.

Since my Written Question and my noble friend’s visit, has his department met Ofcom to enquire why progress in rural areas is so slow? If not, why not? Has his department met BT or Openreach regarding expected progress? Again, if not, why not? Or is getting acceptable speeds to rural areas just too difficult or too expensive?

The Government have just announced another £400 million to boost high-speed broadband, when many parts of the country still do not have the promised 2 megabits Would his money not be better spent providing the basic service that has long been promised the country? Those still languishing in broadband poverty would no doubt welcome the Motion of the noble Baroness, Lady Lane-Fox, if only they had adequate broadband speeds, so they could rise to the challenge.