My Lords, I declare a new interest as an adviser on the telecoms market to Octopus Ventures. I congratulate my noble friend Lord Harlech on his new role and welcome my noble friend Lord Kamall to a small, select club of people with a shared passion for healthcare and telegraph poles. One can find a number of us in the Chamber today. I thank both my noble friends, and the staff in DCMS, for the extremely constructive way that they have approached this Bill and thank my noble friend Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, the predecessor of my noble friend Lord Kamall, for his excellent work on this Bill and more broadly on the DCMS brief.
I am encouraged by this amendment and very grateful for it. It addresses the specific issue that I and others raised in Committee. With that, I also thank my noble friends Lord Vaizey and Lady Stowell, the noble Lords, Lord Fox and Lord Clement-Jones, and the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, for their work. This might be a small and technical amendment, but it has been a real team effort.
I have two clarifying questions. As we discussed in Committee, the devil is in the detail of this, and we share the same goal of being able to lay the fibre cable up the telegraph pole and from one pole to another. Perhaps your Lordships will humour my two very specific questions. First, the amendment gives operators the right to share the existing pole infrastructure
“with the agreement of the main operator.”
Can the Minister explain what proof of permission from a main operator an operator wishing to avail themselves of these provisions will be required to secure? Also, how easy will it be for them to do so? For example, will the normal provisions of PIA be an acceptable route to do that?
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Secondly, the amendment makes it clear—rightly, in my view—that the occupier would still need to grant their consent before works on the pole commence. However, I do not think that any of us want to create extra layers of bureaucracy in doing that. Therefore, could my noble friend explain what proof of consent will be needed for an operator to access land to access their paragraph 74 rights? Would, for example, verbal agreement be sufficient? Subject to hearing my noble friend’s response on those two questions, I am pleased with this amendment.