Rural Broadband and Mobile Coverage

I am happy to agree with the hon. Gentleman on that figure. My key point is that that money will have been spent in vain unless it benefits those in rural areas as well as those in urban areas across the country. Owing to the rural, coastal and sparsely populated nature of Lancashire, there is a real fear that our county could be left behind. A pan-Lancashire proposal endorsed by the local enterprise partnership has been drawn up. It is supported by Blackburn with Darwen borough council, Blackpool council and Lancashire county council. It estimates that, under current proposals, only 66% of premises will have superfast broadband by 2015, leaving 34% without. Needless to say, the 34% will predominantly be in the kind of rural communities that hon. Members have been describing today. The pan-Lancashire proposal seeks to address that shortfall, and the outline proposal for £15 million of funding from the European regional development fund, which my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Eric Ollerenshaw) mentioned earlier, has now been submitted. Lancashire has also submitted a funding proposal for £13 million from the £530 million that the Government are investing through Broadband Delivery UK. I commend that proposal to the Minister and urge him to do even more to connect our rural communities. As many of my constituents in rural communities whose broadband speed is currently less than 1 megabit have said, the adverts for services offering 100 megabit broadband are simply a bad joke.