I am happy to do the three minutes. Thank you for the opportunity to talk to the committee about our annual plan and our “Connected Nations” report. I was about to introduce my colleagues, but the convener has done that for me, so thank you.
I will briefly highlight to the committee some important aspects from both documents. The final version of the annual plan was published last week, and we have circulated it to the committee.
The “Connected Nations” report, which we published in December 2018, shows that although there have been significant improvements in recent years, we are still concerned that too many people in rural areas of Scotland experience slow broadband speeds and poor geographic mobile coverage. We expect to publish an interim update to the data in the coming weeks, but I am happy to share the latest data with the committee this morning. It shows that 92 per cent of premises in Scotland have superfast coverage, with 66 per cent of rural areas covered. There has been an incremental increase on the rural side. On mobile, 41 per cent of Scotland’s landmass has 4G geographic coverage from all four operators. However, it is worth adding that that rises to 78 per cent for at least one operator. I know that that area has been of interest to the committee in the past.
The annual plan sets out our priorities for this financial year. It follows a public consultation on a draft plan, which closed on 8 February. Events were held around the United Kingdom, including in our Edinburgh office, where we had around 40 people in attendance from across the sectors that Ofcom regulates. The event was facilitated by the Ofcom board member for Scotland, who was able to provide direct feedback to the Ofcom board about what stakeholders in Scotland have told us we should be delivering for citizens and consumers.
It is worth saying that the annex to the plan sets out how we have taken into account written and oral representations, including from the Scottish Government, Citizens Advice Scotland, Which? and academics in Scotland. Among other things, the consultation covered opening up spectrum access and its allocation, and price differentiation for broadband packages.
The final plan takes into account our statutory duties, developments in the markets that we regulate and our own strategic priorities. The main themes are similar to those that we discussed when we were in front of you in February last year: we still want better broadband and mobile services for all, and we are still looking to protect consumers from harmful pricing practices.
We are continuing to innovate our approach to regulation to get better outcomes for people and businesses in Scotland and across the rest of the UK. We have shared with the committee our access report, which was published in the past few days and which we might touch on later.
I am very pleased to report some significant progress after our last appearance before the committee. During that session, Mr Lyle raised concerns about the cost of calling directory inquiries services. On Monday, we introduced new rules that will protect callers by capping 118 prices, and that move will significantly cut the cost of many calls, bringing them back to 2012 levels. I commend Mr Lyle’s press release on this matter to other committee members, if they have not seen it.
Moreover, as of 1 April, broadband and land-line customers will automatically get money back from their providers for delayed repairs or installations or missed engineer appointments. We have calculated that, as a result of that new scheme, customers across the UK could benefit from around £142 million in payments. That figure has not been disaggregated for Scotland, but we think that the amount for Scotland will be significant.
It is also worth drawing the committee’s attention to our boost your broadband campaign, which aims to help people identify the fixed broadband services that are available to them and to get better value from their broadband deals. Despite superfast broadband being available to more than nine in 10 Scottish premises and momentum building behind full-fibre broadband, our data shows that people are often not on the fastest service in their area. We recognise that in certain parts of Scotland, there is an issue with limited competition and, therefore, limited consumer choice, but we are encouraging people to check what broadband they need and what is available in their area and to speak to their provider—or, where it is possible for them to do so, shop around—to make sure that they are on the best deal.
Obviously, our “Connected Nations” report and our annual plan are the main focus of today’s evidence-taking session, but I know from our previous sessions that members will have a wide range of questions about connectivity, including in Scotland’s rural and remote areas. We will be very happy to pick up any questions in the session.
Thank you very much, convener.