Broadband Connections to New-build Properties

Part of 2. Questions to the Leader of the House and Chief Whip – in the Senedd at 3:00 pm on 20 June 2018.

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Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 3:00, 20 June 2018

Yes. It's a fundamental small-p political problem because this service is an infrastructure, but the UK Government persists in regarding it as a luxury product that you can buy if you want it, and that's the fundamental difficulty. So, it isn't treated as an infrastructure, or a public service that people require, it is treated as a sort of nice-to-have, which it clearly isn't.

The head of planning has recently written to local authorities reminding them that they can include planning obligations for new build. We have had an agreement with some of the major providers to do that, and as I said, we are monitoring that, but if you're aware of specific estates that were built in between the intervention area and now, then we'll be looking to include those in the new procurements or to get bespoke solutions for those estates. So, it's worth me having a conversation with you, or with my officials, to see if we can find a bespoke solution for that particular problem. But fundamentally, the issue is one of how you politically view this particular service, and I take the view, fundamentally, that it should be an infrastructure.