Rural Broadband and Mobile Coverage

I congratulate the Backbench Business Committee on securing the debate and, of course, the hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart), my Cumbrian neighbour, on leading it. He made a superb speech that touched incredibly well on many issues, particularly the need for a narrative and action on growth and the means to deliver it. There is always space for him on the Opposition Benches—quite a lot of space at the moment. He made the point that, ““Of course we can spend money on X; look at how much we spend everyday on all these terrible wars””, which would chime very well with what some of my colleagues say; I was surprised to hear it from the Conservative Benches. I have worked with him on the need for faster broadband in Cumbria and will say more about that in a moment. It was good to follow the very well-made speech by the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Eric Ollerenshaw). He said that nothing had been done over the past 13 years, and obviously I wish that in many areas we had gone faster. We now need to accelerate progress, but I do not remember being able in 1997 to sit in my room in Barrow—it is upstairs, admittedly—and flick through the 3G and wi-fi on my iPhone, so things have really improved. The regulatory framework put in place by the previous Government has been part of that, and the Minister has past experience of that. We should recognise that much has been done and that much more needs to be done. I should also say that I have written to Mr Speaker to ask to be excused from the winding-up speeches, as I am travelling to Scotland this evening for the funeral of David Cairns tomorrow. I hope that the Minister and other Members will excuse me. In the brief time available, I want to stress the economic importance of faster broadband networks in my constituency and across Cumbria. We of course want faster roll-out and see the urgency of that. I am happy to support the motion tabled by the hon. Member for Penrith and The Border, but we need to do this as fast as possible, and 2015 is still a significant way off. There is a need for greater action from the Government and from broadband providers, which we must not forget. I want to mention the example of Kates Skates in Barrow. Barrow is an urban areas, but urban areas within larger rural counties experience these problems cheek by jowl with people and companies that would more readily be associated with rural surroundings, as the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood noted. In 1996, Chris and Catherine Palmen thought that it would be a good idea to construct an indoor ice rink in the centre of Barrow. It actually turned out to be a bad idea, which did not get anywhere at all, but their story is testament to our extraordinary entrepreneurial spirit in Furness and throughout the country, because unperturbed by the mammoth flop of that business the Palmens decided to go into retail. Kates Skates started with ice skates and quickly expanded to the point now where it has possibly Europe's largest range of skates, skateboards, snowboards—if any Government Members are skater boys or girls, they can help me out—and scooters. The company has a really tremendous range, ships upwards of 250 orders a day from its small store and employs about 20 people, with 5% of its orders coming from the shop in Furness and 95% from online orders from the rest of the UK and, increasingly, Europe. That is exactly the kind of business that we need to promote to ensure that such concerns can prosper anywhere in the UK, but the Palmens tell me of their enormous frustration at their slow broadband connection, which really hampers their internal processes. They spent quite a lot of money developing 3D images of their products, but having reached that stage they realised that they could not put them online because their broadband link was too slow to sustain them. We have to be able to do something about that. Companies such as Kates Skates say, ““We started up in the area where we are from, we want to stay there, we love the quality of life in Barrow and the access to elsewhere in the Lake district, and we don't want to move to a larger city.”” The Palmens are in an increasingly difficult situation, however, because of the slow broadband with which they are forced to contend. Many people have raised this problem with me, and I am sure that we will hear further examples throughout the day. CGP Books in Broughton, a great company producing textbooks, has itself shelled out for a faster link, but the increasing costs are obviously affecting its bottom line. Furness Internet, which provides services throughout the area, has frustrated customers who want to do more but cannot because of a single point of failure: the data cable that it purchased at great expense. The company says that the cable is relatively reliable at the moment, but if it goes down, all the customers of Furness Internet will be up the swanny, and that is really worrying for people who are looking to locate to the area. I spoke to the head of Cumbria's chamber of commerce today, who stressed how absolutely essential it is for us to sort out the problem if we are to drive wider progress in the county.