Ben Everitt, the MP for Milton Keynes North, has welcomed the Conservative Government investing in a new contract to deliver lightning-fast, reliable broadband to more areas of Milton Keynes.
In 2019 the Government launched its flagship £5 billion Project Gigabit programme to enable hard-to-reach communities to access lightning-fast gigabit-capable broadband and this has seen huge success with 93.6% of properties in Milton Keynes now having access.
But local MP Ben recently spoke in Parliament about the importance of ensure all rural communities, like villages such as Stoke Goldington, have access to Gigabit broadband. And now the Government has confirmed funding for the project which will see 25,700 homes and businesses in Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and Milton Keynes benefit from a rollout by CityFibre.
In his Westminster Hall speech on 24th January, Ben Everitt MP said: "Ensuring that coverage reaches our rural villages is crucial. I have some beautiful villages in my patch, including Hanslope, Ravenstone, Stoke Goldington and Weston Underwood—crikey, I will have to mention them all now! But you have said that there is a time limit, Dame Maria, so I cannot mention all the beautiful villages. We have thriving local businesses, farms and communities, which all ultimately depend on consistent mobile coverage.
"My rural constituents often tell me that they have a restricted choice of networks, compared with people living in the more built-up urban areas that I represent. The shared rural network will address that problem directly by arranging for the UK’s four main mobile operators to upgrade their infrastructure and share access with each other. I know that will be welcome news for rural constituencies and communities across the country, giving businesses and our communities more choice and driving competition, which is crucial.
"That is the key message that I took from the hon. Member for North Shropshire: it is about competition. The economic angle in this debate comes to prominence here. Consistent and complete mobile coverage across the UK is one of the missing pieces of our ability to unlock and unleash economic growth outside the UK’s big cities and populated areas. Better coverage will help businesses to increase their efficiency, which is obviously useful for consumers and customers.
"The other important side to this debate is the issue of inequality. Improving rural connectivity is about tackling regional inequalities and the digital exclusion that we been fighting during this Parliament. It is about levelling up. With the shift towards more working from home since the pandemic, the need for consistent coverage is more important than ever for working families in rural areas. With these types of national projects, it is important that we take a sustainable approach, and that is why the shared rural network is so effective. The masts will be shared by the network providers. When new masts are built, they will have to go through planning, so that communities get their say. I look forward to seeing how this project develops."
