{"id":37252,"date":"2024-02-22T00:03:56","date_gmt":"2024-02-22T00:03:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ispreview.co.uk\/?p=37252"},"modified":"2024-02-22T07:54:04","modified_gmt":"2024-02-22T07:54:04","slug":"nao-warn-gbp1bn-uk-rural-4g-mobile-rollout-is-facing-delays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ispreview.co.uk\/index.php\/2024\/02\/nao-warn-gbp1bn-uk-rural-4g-mobile-rollout-is-facing-delays.html","title":{"rendered":"NAO Warn GBP1bn UK Rural 4G Mobile Rollout is Facing Delays"},"content":{"rendered":"

The UK’s independent public spending watchdog, the National Audit Office<\/a> (NAO), has today published a new report into \u00a31bn industry-led Shared Rural Network<\/a> project (i.e. extending 4G<\/a> mobile \/ broadband cover to 95% of the UK by the end of 2025), which finds that it’s “behind schedule<\/em>” and at risk of cost overruns.<\/p>\n

The SRN \u2013 supported by \u00a3501m<\/strong> of public funding and \u00a3532m<\/strong> from operators \u2013 involves both the reciprocal sharing of existing masts in certain areas and the demand-led building and sharing of new masts in others between the operators (MNO). But the 95% target is only when service is available from at least one operator, while the UK coverage forecast for SRN completion for all operators is actually just 84% (i.e. geographic areas where you\u2019ll be able to take 4G<\/a> from all providers).<\/p>\n

NOTE:<\/strong> The target varies between regions, thus 4G<\/a> cover from at least one operator is expected to reach 98% in England, 91% in Scotland, 95% in Wales and 98% in N.Ireland. But when looking at coverage from all MNOs combined, this falls to 90% in England, 74% in Scotland, 80% in Wales and 85% in N.Ireland.<\/div>\n

The programme actually consists of two targets for mobile operators to meet. One of the first of those reflects the deadline for delivery of industry funded coverage improvements in Partial Not-Spot<\/strong> (PNS) areas (i.e. areas which receive coverage from at least one operator, but not all), which needs to be achieved by June 2024 (at this point 4G must cover 88% of the UK\u2019s landmass).<\/p>\n

After that, Ofcom<\/a> has also set a deadline for improvements in Total Not-Spot<\/strong> (TNS) areas of early 2027. Just to be clear, Ofcom<\/a>’s licence obligations commit each individual operator to increase its 4G coverage to 88% of UK landmass by June 2024 \u2013 and to 90% by January 2027 \u2013 with these individual obligations supporting the overall target of 95% by December 2025.<\/p>\n

In addition, the government’s \u00a3501m of funding – spread over 20 years (until 2039-40) – is both intended to reduce TNS and will also be partly used to develop the Extended Area Service<\/strong> (EAS \u2013 building 4G coverage to the public onto the Home Office\u2019s Emergency Service Network in remote areas).<\/p>\n

NOTE:<\/strong> The SRN also aims to provide guaranteed coverage to an additional 280,000 UK premises, 16,000km of roads and boost \u2018in car\u2019 coverage on around 45,000 km of road, as well as better indoor coverage for around 1.2 million premises.<\/div>\n

\"SRN-Targets-and-Timelines\"<\/p>\n

As previously reported (here<\/a>), EE<\/a> (BT<\/a>) recently became the first mobile network operator to report having achieved the first target for PNS areas, which they managed some six months ahead of schedule. But to be fair, EE<\/a> did enter the SRN with the strongest geographic 4G coverage of any UK mobile operator, after having initially invested more than their rivals into improving rural 4G coverage.<\/p>\n

Overall, this sounds like good news, and it is, but the wider programme has some significant problems to tackle.<\/p>\n

Findings of the NAO Report<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

The new report confirms that Three UK<\/a>, Vodafone<\/a> and O2<\/a> are “each likely to miss their Ofcom<\/a> licence obligation to provide 88% 4G coverage by June 2024<\/em>” and have requested to “discuss an 18-month extension to the PNS element of the programme<\/em>.” Such a development was reported by newspapers last year (here<\/a>), although until now only Three UK<\/a> has been willing to confirm any specifics.<\/p>\n

Summary of Key SRN Findings<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u27a4 Reasons for delay vary. Government and the MNOs took longer than expected to finalise mast locations, agree site sharing and access, and procure services. Progress on the programme has also been delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, opposition from local campaign groups and local authorities\u2019 capacity to handle planning applications.<\/p>\n

As a result, DSIT\u2019s funding of expenditure by the MNOs and Home Office on masts in 2022-23 and 2023-24 was almost \u00a362 million (79%) lower than planned. As at January 2024, one EAS mast was operational for commercial 4G coverage, and the Home Office had made nine sites in total available to MNOs, compared to 75 planned by this date. Site acquisition on the TNS element is on track against a timetable agreed in 2023, with the first masts due to become operational in January 2025.<\/p>\n

\u27a4 Estimated costs have risen significantly on the programme, due to high inflation and other factors, although government does not yet know by how much in total. As a result of cost pressures, MNOs may no longer be able to deliver the level of coverage required within the current funding.<\/p>\n

Under the terms of their grant agreement with the government, MNOs bear any additional costs. However, if costs are excessive, MNOs may not be obliged to meet individual targets, further risking the overall ambition to achieve 95% mobile coverage across the UK landmass.<\/p>\n

\u27a4 DSIT\u2019s business case suggests the investment will deliver economic benefits of \u00a31.352 billion through supporting tourism and business productivity in rural areas. However, the business case included limited evidence of the specific benefits of extending mobile coverage into remote or sparsely populated areas.<\/p>\n

\u27a4 Ofcom requires MNOs to meet a minimum download speed of just 2Mbps (megabits per second). DSIT anticipates an average download speed of 7Mbps for rural areas, though the Department acknowledges some areas will have lower download speeds. DSIT expects these lower speeds to meet current needs but recognises that advances in technology could lead to people requiring higher performance in the future, meaning the network may need upgrades.<\/p>\n

\u27a4 The NAO recommends improved oversight of MNOs on the SRN programme to enable effective decision making and sufficient focus on delivering the 4G performance for consumers and businesses. The Building Digital UK<\/a> (BDUK) agency currently has oversight, but “although they provide BDUK with updates on progress, they do not routinely provide, for example, data on the level of coverage achieved, or forecasts<\/em>“.<\/p>\n

\u27a4 By 2023, the SRN programme had contributed to a 1.3 percentage point increase in coverage. Ofcom reported that, as at September 2023, 92.7% of the UK landmass had 4G coverage from at least one MNO, up from 91.4% in 2020 and against a target of 95% by December 2025. This increase is predominantly due to additional coverage funded by the MNOs, including their delivery of the PNS element of the programme.<\/p>\n

DSIT was unable to provide details of progress in meeting coverage targets for premises and roads, and is working with Ofcom to develop the necessary data, but it told us that the MNOs are confident that they will achieve these targets.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The report also touches on 5G<\/a> services, specifically the Government\u2019s new Wireless Infrastructure Strategy<\/strong> (WIS), which set out an ambition for \u201call populated areas<\/u> to be covered by \u2018standalone\u2019 5G<\/a> (5G<\/a>-plus) by 2030<\/em>\u201d (here<\/a>). But as we’ve said before, the use of vague terms like “all populated areas<\/em>” doesn’t really make for the clearest of targets, and we’d have preferred to see one based around geographic coverage.<\/p>\n

The NAO said that achieving the 5G SA target will be “challenging<\/em>” and called on the government to “establish target dates for taking key decisions about the outcomes it is seeking; determine the combination of enablers required to deliver 5G connectivity; collect data on the market\u2019s ability to meet the UK\u2019s future 5G connectivity needs; and learn lessons from delivering earlier digital infrastructure<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

Gareth Davies, Head of the NAO, said:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cDemand for mobile data access is expected to increase as data-intensive services become more popular and new technologies enable new uses, and government has set out a clear ambition for improved connectivity.<\/p>\n

It is unclear whether the Shared Rural Network programme will achieve its coverage target on time; costs are higher than anticipated; and government has not clearly articulated the benefits of aspects of the programme, including increased connectivity in sparsely populated areas.<\/p>\n

As government develops its 5G strategy, it will need to more clearly define what it is aiming to achieve in different parts of the UK and economic sectors, so that limited resources can be targeted where they deliver most value.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The news of a potential delay probably won\u2019t come as too much of a surprise to ISPreview\u2019s regular readers, as past mobile infrastructure projects have often struggled to achieve their targets \u2013 either on time or more generally. Finding suitable sites, securing the necessary permissions through the planning system, obtaining power supply and fibre backhaul \u2013 particularly in remote rural areas, are all known bugbears.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, BT<\/a>’s Chief Security and Networks Officer, Howard Watson<\/strong>, recently highlighted how some issues, such as the impact of both the COVID-19 pandemic and long-delays (up to 500 days) in being able to secure planning permission for the sites, didn’t stop them being able to achieving their part of the project ahead of schedule (here<\/a>). It’s all in the planning, claimed Watson.<\/p>\n

The government have also recently introduced new legislation to help ease some of the challenges, particularly around infrastructure sharing, upgrades to existing sites and taller masts. But Ofcom has only recently consulted (here<\/a>) on adopting some of those changes into their latest update to the Electronic Communications Code<\/strong> (ECC), which means operators have yet to fully benefit.<\/p>\n

Ofcom are also expected to publish their own review of the SRN\u2019s progress this year, which should provide a lot more information on how far behind the three operators really are and what they must do to correct that.<\/p>\n

NAO 4G SRN Progress Report<\/strong><\/span>
\nhttps:\/\/www.nao.org.uk\/reports\/supporting-mobile-connectivity\/<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The UK’s independent public spending watchdog, the National Audit Office (NAO), has today published a new report into \u00a31bn industry-led Shared Rural Network project (i.e. extending 4G mobile \/ broadband cover to 95% of the UK by the end of 2025), which finds that it’s “behind schedule” and at risk of cost overruns.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23249,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,1645],"tags":[61,474,471,405,60,414,32,38,89,63,96,71],"class_list":["post-37252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uk_isp_news","category-key_uk_isp_industry_developments","tag-4g","tag-bt","tag-bduk","tag-ee","tag-mobile-broadband","tag-northern-ireland","tag-o2","tag-politics","tag-scotland","tag-three-uk","tag-vodafone","tag-wales"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/mastodon.social\/@ispreview\/111972210474895848","error":""},"yoast_head":"\nNAO Warn GBP1bn UK Rural 4G Mobile Rollout is Facing Delays - 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