Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps he is taking to improve mobile reliability in rural areas.

4G geographic coverage from at least one mobile network operator (MNO) has now reached over 95% of the UK landmass, but our ambition is for all populated areas of the UK to benefit from high quality, reliable, 5G standalone coverage by 2030; this includes rural areas.

We continue to work closely with the MNOs and are committed to ensuring we have the right policy and regulatory framework in place to support investment into mobile networks and competition in the market, while Ofcom’s improved online coverage checker, which will go live in the second half of June, will help consumers identify the MNOs with the best coverage in their area.

We are also collaborating with Ofcom to carry out further analysis on mobile network resilience, following a consultation that invited input from the industry and the public on power backup provision.