Kevin Hollinrake – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kevin Hollinrake on 2016-01-21.

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to ensure the continued delivery of essential mobile telephone infrastructure to rural areas after the completion of the Mobile Infrastructure Project on 31 March 2016.

Mr Edward Vaizey

Improving mobile coverage remains a priority for the Government, and our landmark agreement in December 2014 with the four mobile network operators (MNOs) to provide voice and SMS text coverage to at least 90% of the UK landmass by 2017 will significantly improve coverage in the UK. It guarantees £5 billion of investment in mobile infrastructure, and as a result mobile services will come to some areas for the first time. It will halve partial not-spots (where the is coverage from at least one MNO, but not all four), and cut total not spots by two thirds by end 2017. Additionally, Telefonica has a licence obligation to deliver indoor 4G coverage to 98% of premises in the UK by 2017. Other MNOs have indicated that they will match this commitment.