Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 18th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Ian Murray]

I am happy for that to be arranged with Luca, the parish council and my hon. Friend, along with officials from Building Digital UK, so that we can explore the solutions that are possible for his constituents. The Minister for Digital Economy, who sits in the other place, will be holding a surgery for Members of this House on 14 April, and I think my hon. Friend should go along and discuss these issues with her as well.

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

I could reel off countless examples of villages in my constituency where hard-to-reach areas simply have no broadband at all, let alone fibre broadband. Constituents and businesses are tearing their hair out. At what point will the Government possibly accept that if the millions—if not billions—of pounds are to reach those hard-to-reach places, it would probably be better to help those people to get, for instance, satellite broadband instead, so that they can have access to the internet now rather than having to wait for years?

[Ian Murray]

I am happy for the hon. Gentleman also to meet representatives of BDUK and the Minister for Digital Economy. He is absolutely right; while there will continue to be gaps for the very hardest-to-reach places, there are solutions out there, like wireless solutions, fixed-wireless access and, indeed, satellite broadband, which BDUK is examining now.

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[The Prime Minister]

I am very happy to discuss that with my hon. Friend. We will always protect high welfare standards, and, through our food and drink deal, we are bringing down barriers for farmers selling to our largest market. Alongside our record £11.8 billion farming budget and investment in cutting-edge innovation, our farming profitability review is focused on boosting profitability. I have already acted and set up the farming and food partnership board, investing £30 million in our farmer collaboration fund.

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

Q11. Traffic chaos from a botched road realignment is affecting Calvert Green, Steeple Claydon and Twyford. Landowners are still awaiting payment for land taken. There is woeful underfunding of promised mitigation projects in Wendover after inadequate noise modelling. Many years ago, the Prime Minister and I used to be united in our opposition to High Speed 2. He changed. With the upcoming HS2 reset, will he make a personal intervention to ensure that my constituents and communities living with this hell on earth of a construction project are finally treated with the fairness and respect that they deserve?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising this matter. I know how much it impacts his constituents and how deeply they feel about it. It is important, as we reset and clear up the mess that was left, that we have in our mind’s eye those who are most affected, and make sure that it is fair and that their voices are heard, and we will do so.