Speech in the Scottish Parliament

21 January 2010

03 February 2010

That the Parliament welcomes the UK Government's commitment to improving availability of broadband as detailed in the Digital Britain report published in June 2009; welcomes the commitment to deliver a Universal Service Broadband Commitment of 2Mbps by 2012; welcomes the proposed public support for the network of tomorrow to allow for access to next generation broadband; considers the Western Isles of Scotland to be the worst area in Scotland in terms of broadband coverage and one of worst in the United Kingdom as a whole; is concerned at the disadvantages that rural areas of Scotland suffer in terms of economic, business and educational development when broadband services are inadequate, and would welcome a positive response to the report and the delivery of improved and reliable broadband services for every Scottish broadband customer.

Peter Peacock : I welcome this further opportunity to debate broadband.

It is an important issue for many of our areas, as we know from a recent debate.

I will focus on the "Digital Britain" report and try to explore some of the answers to the challenges that we know exist, rather than dwell on the problem, because the debate in Murdo Fraser's name a couple of months ago adequately rehearsed many of the problems that we and our constituents face.

I warmly welcome the "Digital Britain" report, particularly the bit of it that relates to broadband

It is the first explicit recognition that the private markets will not provide for large parts of the United Kingdom, particularly areas that many members who are present represent.

That is particularly the case in the Highlands and Islands, where investment is at its highest and yet the returns from the marketplace are at their lowest, because of population dispersal and the low population: there is no return on the investment, so it is not going to happen.

The report explicitly recognises the need for public investment because markets are not able to provide.

That follows a long line of past initiatives by previous Governments—Conservative and Labour—here and at UK level. Indeed, the current Scottish National Party Government is carrying that forward in the Scottish context.

I was pleased this week to see the Tories recognise that there is a need for public intervention—there was a policy announcement in the south about that.

The report sets out an explicit minimum universal service commitment—2Mbps for everybody in the UK by 2012. That is quite modest by modern standards, but it is still challenging for many parts of Scotland.

It is hugely important for many people whom I represent—and for people who are represented by other members who are present—who currently do not have anything like that capacity.

I welcome the £200 million fund to help to achieve that.

The report further recognises that the next thing to look at after the 2Mbps commitment is next-generation access and superfast broadband.

The UK has announced a £1 billion fund to move towards that.

Although there might be disagreement between the Tories and the Labour Party at UK level about how to fund that, there is, nonetheless, an agreement that there is a requirement for funds.

In the short term, it is vital that the Scottish interest in all that be represented to the unit that is looking at the issue in the south.

There is a network design and procurement group that will help to use up the £200 million.

It is vital that the Scottish Government play a role in representing Scotland's interests to that group.

There is not just a Scottish interest: there needs also to be a regional view, and local pictures have to be developed throughout Scotland, which will help to build up the national picture.

We have to identify blockages in infrastructure, pinch points and the backhaul capacity issues that we need to resolve if we are to move forward.

The report highlights the Western Isles as having the worst broadband connections in the UK in many respects. There is also an issue with the connection between the Western Isles and the mainland and the backhaul capacity across the Minch.

That is only one of the things that might require to be funded out of the £200 million.

I met the UK minister a few weeks ago. I arranged a meeting of various Scottish interests to talk to him about these things.

He is aware of the issues and he has some insight into them.

I understand that the Minister for Enterprise, Energy and Tourism will be meeting the UK minister in a few weeks to talk about these things.

The Scottish Government has a strong role to play in making a case for a very big share of the £200 million.

I would not support talk of a per capita share, because our needs are greater and we are further behind many parts of the UK.

We require a good slug—to use a technical term—of that £200 million.

In due course, we will also need a good slug of the £1 billion that is coming along.

The Scottish Government has a key role in developing a digital Scottish vision from current strands of policy, many of which are evident.

A lot of people have a lot of ideas about how to solve

the problems, which need to be pulled together in a public policy for Scotland.

Some of the new thinking would allow us—particularly, believe it or not, in the Highlands and Islands—to leapfrog the 2Mbps commitment and move pretty quickly to superfast broadband. We have some of the funding streams in place.

There is the £200 million, the £1 billion that is coming along, and the LEADER programme that the Government is pursuing here.

The wider rural development programme might be able to contribute, too.

That could achieve for Scotland far more than the 90 per cent coverage that the report envisages next-generation broadband will cover.

We already have public investment in place.

The Highlands and Islands and the south of Scotland had the pathfinder investments in our schools, libraries and other public buildings paid for—with spare capacity in the system.

I encourage the opening of access to that spare capacity. Highland Council would be a key player in that, as would Cable & Wireless, which bought Thus, which made the original investment.

I encourage the minister to encourage those bodies to provide access to that.

We have communities that are thirsting for improvement and which have the capacity for self-help.

We have technical advances: Professor Buneman of the University of Edinburgh is doing interesting work with wireless technology, and I spoke to a guy from Skye last week who is putting wireless technology into campsites across the Highlands and Islands.

He is using a local aggregation point to deliver a signal wirelessly, with potentially very high bandwidth.

We need to help those communities to make use of such technology and to access the funding for it.

Models of support are available that have worked. In the past, the Highlands and Islands Enterprise community land unit has helped communities to purchase their land, and the community energy unit has helped communities to get involved in community renewables

Perhaps it is time for a community broadband support unit to help communities to take advantage of the technology that exists.

We know what the challenges are. "Digital Britain" commits us to public interventions, and public funds are available at Scotland level for that.

Communities are anxious and willing to make progress, and there are technical advances that would enable them to leapfrog current expectations.

All that desperately needs to be pulled together at Scotland level, quickly and coherently, to ensure that we can access the digital Britain funds. I encourage the minister to do that.

He should work with councils, with Scottish Enterprise, with Highlands and Islands Enterprise and even with other political parties—there is consensus on some of the issues across the parties, although there are differences, too.

He should also work with the private interests that have insights into and interests in the subject.

Only by limiting our own imagination and vision will we hold ourselves back.

I can see a clear way forward and I am personally more than happy to contribute to the policy's development.

I urge the minister to act quickly on those and a range of other issues in order to see whether we can find some innovative and clear solutions to take us forward faster than anybody currently believes is possible.