{"id":25747,"date":"2021-03-05T08:33:45","date_gmt":"2021-03-05T08:33:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ispreview.co.uk\/?p=25747"},"modified":"2021-03-05T08:35:10","modified_gmt":"2021-03-05T08:35:10","slug":"new-uk-law-passed-to-spread-gigabit-broadband-into-big-buildings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ispreview.co.uk\/index.php\/2021\/03\/new-uk-law-passed-to-spread-gigabit-broadband-into-big-buildings.html","title":{"rendered":"New UK Law Passed to Spread Gigabit Broadband into Big Buildings"},"content":{"rendered":"

After a long wait the new Telecommunications Infrastructure (Leasehold Property) Bill is set to become law, albeit with a few changes, after passing through parliament. The law aims to make it quicker and cheaper for “gigabit-capable<\/em>” ISPs to access big blocks of flats or apartments (MDU) when “rogue landlords<\/em>” fail to respond.<\/p>\n

At present network operators (e.g. Openreach<\/a>, Virgin Media<\/a>, Hyperoptic<\/a>, Cityfibre<\/a> etc.) often run into difficulty when attempting to contact landlords, such as while requesting permission to install a new service or offering to negotiate a long-term agreement for access (wayleave). Suffice to say that an unresponsive landlord can leave residents trapped on slower connections and the process for tackling this is often shockingly expensive.<\/p>\n

NOTE:<\/strong> Examples suggest that the existing process could cost \u00a314,000 and take many months, which falls to c.\u00a3300 under the new approach that may only take a few weeks.<\/div>\n

Admittedly some landlords do have legitimate concerns about damage to property, liability (e.g. health and safety rules) and low rental payments, among other things. Nevertheless, there are also plenty of cases where there may be no real downside to an operator wanting to improve the broadband connectivity of a building, except getting permission.<\/p>\n

The new law seeks to tackle such issues by implementing a significantly cheaper and faster route for dispute resolution via a new tribunal process. On top of that landlords will also face a greater obligation to help facilitate the deployment of digital infrastructure when they receive a request from their tenants. But this will ONLY apply when a landlord has repeatedly failed to respond to requests for access to install a connection that a tenant within the building has requested.<\/p>\n

Back in 2019 the government estimated that as many as 3,000 extra residential buildings (MDUs) a year could be connected as a result of this change. The UK is currently home to an estimated 480,000 blocks of flats or apartments, although many of those do have responsive landlords.<\/p>\n

Baroness Barran, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for DCMS, said:<\/strong><\/p>\n

“This Government\u2019s ambition is to support the delivery of fast, reliable, resilient broadband to every home and business in this country. Noble Lords will be aware\u2014not least from our discussions during the passage of the Bill\u2014of the myriad, complex barriers that face infrastructure deployment. There is no panacea, but the Bill provides a modest yet vital development.<\/p>\n

Despite having once been described by the Guardian as \u201can obscure technical bill\u201d, it has within its initial scope some 10 million people in the UK who live in flats and apartments. It also contains the flexibility to bring still more people into its scope in the future, such as those in office blocks and business parks, where the evidence points to it.<\/p>\n

We expect these provisions, once commenced, to make a real difference to rollout, along with other measures we are taking forward such as mandating gigabit connectivity to new-build developments and reforms to the street-works regime so that it better supports deployment.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In terms of changes, a few amendments were made, albeit nothing too significant. But the government did approve some tweaks in order to help clarify that people who merely rent their flat can also make use of the policy in the bill (i.e. serving the interests of tenants as well as leaseholders).<\/p>\n

However, the Government rejected a proposal to conduct periodic reviews of the legislation after it has become law, which was intended to assess whether or not it is sufficient to support access to 1Gbps broadband in every property in the United Kingdom by 2025.<\/em> One issue here, other than the fact that the 100% coverage target has now been watered down to 85% by the end of 2025, is that the Government don’t want to force everybody to only take a 1Gbps service as that may hinder some deployments and technology \/ ISP choices for consumers.<\/p>\n

Otherwise, the new law represents good news for network operators, particularly those investing their own money to expand across urban areas where larger apartment blocks and high rises are much more common. 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 make.<\/p>\n

On top of that the Government will need to ensure that the new tribunal process has enough capacity to handle any additional workload that may come its way. Failure to do that would risk creating further delays, although Matt Warman MP<\/strong> (UK Minister for Digital) has previously pledged to “make sure<\/em>” that the tribunal will get those resources.<\/p>\n

The Electronic Communications Code<\/strong> (ECC) will also need to be amended in order to include the new process, which should happen alongside some other adjustments that are being made to the code (here<\/a>). Assuming all goes to plan then these changes will help to support the Government’s new \u00a35bn Gigabit Broadband Programme<\/strong><\/a> (F20).<\/p>\n

\n
\n

Great news that the Telecoms Infrastructure Leasehold Property Bill has now passed through Parliament <\/p>\n

Such a technical name hides a big impact: 100,000s of people living in blocks of flats will now get access to gigabit broadband faster and more easily #getbroadbanddone<\/a><\/p>\n

— Oliver Dowden (@OliverDowden) March 5, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n