Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, the (a) number and (b) location of mobile sites EE will build using state aid under the Emergency Services Network contract in North Ayrshire and Arran constituency; how many such sites have received planning approval; how many such sites have entered the build phase; how many such sites were live as of 1 February 2018; how many such sites are being built with the capacity for multi-occupancy; how many such sites have a confirmed second tenant; and how much money from the public purse has been allocated for each such site.

I can confirm there will be 3 new EE sites and 5 Extended Area Service (EAS) sites located in the constituency of North Ayrshire and Arran.

All new EE sites are being built and delivered to agreed Home Office timeframes and where possible will go live earlier to support commercial coverage. All 3 new sites in North Ayrshire and Arran have planning permission. None of the three new sites are commercially available at present.

In respect of EAS sites I can confirm that there are currently 5 sites proposed on Arran and 1 has planning permission approved (or 1 HoTs signed – as none have yet entered the build phase).

Of the c.500 new sites EE is building, 291 will transfer over to the Home Office at the end of the contract term. EE is making available details of all shareable new sites to other mobile network operators proactively both directly and through an existing website used by the industry to arrange site sharing. EE has made available the details of 350 sites. EE is confident that the 291 sites which will transfer to the Home Office will be selected from this portfolio, and the Home Office and EE have now agreed 104 of these sites (and are working on confirming on which of the remainder will make up the rest of the 291). These will be shareable in accordance with the terms of the EC Decision in relation to State aid for this Programme.

Separately the Home Office, through the EAS project, are delivering circa 292 individual sites. I would also like to reassure you that the Home Office has been proactive in seeking to build masts that support multi-operator use where practicable.

Finally I thought it helpful to remind you that the Emergency Services Network is designed to, first and foremost, deliver a ‘blue-light’ communications service.