Superfast Broadband

Part of 2. Questions to the Leader of the House – in the Senedd at 2:23 pm on 24 January 2018.

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Photo of Angela Burns Angela Burns Conservative 2:23, 24 January 2018

Please don't pay BT for Princes Gate. During the time I've been told on numerous occasions that Princes Gate will get fast broadband. In fact, last year, the head of Superfast Cymru—I won't name him—wrote and told me that a second pass would see Princes Gate be upgraded to superfast broadband by the autumn of 2017. The response from the leader of Openreach:

'The infrastructure serving your community forms part of a programme we were running which ended on Sunday 31 December 2017. This is a hard stop'—  we're not doing anymore. And it's not just Princes Gate. Cynwyl Elfed, Hermon, Lawrenny, Martletwy, bits of Pembroke—they've all got this. They had the promise, they were told categorically—and Llanpumsaint—they were going to get it, and now they're not. I don't actually hold you personally responsible, Minister, because I know that you really believe in the delivery of this, but I would like you to talk fairly strongly to BT and to Openreach. They cannot make promises to people and then just basically say, 'Tough luck. It's finished. Too bad', because these people have lives to live, businesses to run, kids to educate. Broadband, superfast, is today's universal provision we all need, and I fail to see why my constituency should be so disadvantaged.