Part of 4. Questions to the Leader of the House and Chief Whip – in the Senedd at 4:05 pm on 11 December 2018.
We very much followed the superfast roll-out programme with a business exploitation programme and the domestic exploitation programme—some of you may have seen there's a big yellow cartoon lightning bolt that arrives on your village green with a big sign—and then we run programmes for people to come and understand how to get the best out of the service that's arrived and how to assess the need for their business in particular. So, domestic use—unless you've got an enormous number of teenage children who all want access at the same time, it's fine at 24 Mbps or so, but most businesses have a bespoke need. And so one of the things with any new technology exploitation is making sure that the businesses do their business assessment of their need and the need for them to invest in the service correctly, because they need to understand what exponential growth can come from some of the accesses.
The business exploitation team follow the superfast roll-out around—doing two authorities at a time across Wales, in fact. We write out to everybody in the authority, and that alerts them to the fact that they could get it and, occasionally, it alerts us to the fact that we think somebody could get it and they haven't. And just in terms of proportion on that, we write thousands of the letters out and we get tens back. But it is a useful checker, if you like—an additional checker. But Bethan Sayed is absolutely right, because sometimes people wait for the superfast programme to come, they get 30 Mbps or so, but they run a large caravan site or a big farm business and, actually, they need 100 Mbps in oder to get their business need. So, the system is capable of delivering that, but they have to understand what they require and then we can help them get the best internet service provider, for example, and a system with planning for that. So, I'm very much aware of the point she raises, and it's a really good point, and so we are trying to futureproof the system in that way.
And the last thing to say is there has been a really good report by south Wales university—the University of South Wales; I always say that the wrong way around—about what happens to small businesses when they exploit the internet properly and what happens when they don't. I've mentioned it a number of times, and it's in the Members' library. It is worth having a look, because it really is quite stark, the difference, and so we use that as a way to encourage people to understand that the investment is worth it for their business. It might seem like a lot, but it's actually worth it for the business growth.