New UK Laws Boost Gigabit Broadband into MDUs and New Build Homes

The UK Gov has confirmed that two new laws came into force on 26th Dec 2022, which make it both mandatory for property developers to ensure that new build homes are constructed with support for faster broadband, and to make it easier to expand that into big residential buildings (MDU) when “rogue landlords” fail to respond.

At present almost 73% of UK premises are already within reach of “gigabit-capable broadband” speeds (here), but there have long been some weak spots that the new laws seek to tackle. The first represents the government’s recent update to the old Building Regulations 2010 (aka – the Building etc. (Amendment) (England) (No. 2) Regulations 2022), which we’ve already summarised extensively before (here).

The government says this will ensure that new homes constructed in England will be “fitted with infrastructure and connections capable of delivering gigabit broadband“. But as we’ve said before, the actual policy is technically somewhat less prescriptive and only mandates “at least a superfast broadband connection” (30Mbps+), before adding, “failing that, at least a Universal Service Obligation-standard” connection (10Mbps+).

However, even where a gigabit-capable connection is not available within the £2,000 cost cap for this policy, gigabit-ready infrastructure, such as ducts, chambers and termination points, still need to be installed. “This will ensure that homes are fit for the digital age, but may not be connected straight away,” said the government (DCMS).

Nevertheless, it should be said that the gap that this legislation seeks to correct has largely already been tackled by the market. Data referenced in the government’s related technical consultation suggested that approximately 12% (just 25,300 homes) still did not have access to a “full fibre” (FTTP) connection upon construction in a typical year. But more recent data, from a different source, suggested that 99.03% of houses constructed during the first half of 2022 were connected to a gigabit-capable network (here).

Julia Lopez, Digital Infrastructure Minister, said:

“Nothing should stop people from seizing the benefits of better broadband, whether it is an unresponsive landlord or a property developer’s failure to act.

Thanks to our new laws, millions of renters will no longer be prevented from getting a broadband upgrade due to the silence of their landlord, and those moving into newly built homes can be confident they’ll have access to the fastest speeds available from the day they move in.”

The second big law being referenced above is the Telecommunications Infrastructure (Leasehold Property) Act (TILPA), which we’ve also summarised extensively before (here). The law was actually passed some time ago in 2021, but it’s only new being formally introduced after the usual round of consultations, and applies to both England and Wales (Scotland will get a similar process during summer 2023).

TILPA aims to make it quicker and cheaper for “gigabit-capable” ISPs / network operators to access big blocks of flats or apartments (MDUs or multi-dwelling units) when “rogue landlords” fail to respond, and tenants demand faster connections. The new rules essentially tackle this by introducing a significantly cheaper and faster route for dispute resolution via a new court process, but this only applies after a landlord has repeatedly failed to respond to requests for access.

According to the announcement, broadband network operators have said around 40% of their requests for access to install connections receive no response, which means that impacted tenants may lose out on the benefits of faster speeds. But now it’s hoped that providers will be able to seek rights to access a property or shared land if the person required to grant access is unresponsive. “From the point where a company makes the first request to the landlord, it will take 35 days for this new rule to kick in,” said DCMS.

However, landlords, assuming they respond, will still be able to challenge the making of such an order and so it remains to be seen how much of a difference this will actually make. On top of that, the Government will need to ensure that the new court process has enough capacity to handle any additional workload that may come its way. Failure to do that would risk creating further delays. All of this has involved a few updates to the Electronic Communications Code (ECC).

At this point it’s worth highlighting that further changes are also on the way as part of the new Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Act (PSTI), which involves more changes to the ECC that will aim to make it easier for full fibre broadband and mobile operators to upgrade, share and deploy new infrastructure (see detailed summary).