To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills what steps his Department is taking to facilitate the provision in the South West of the access to broadband internet services as outlined in the Digital Britain report. (318865)

Since the publication of the Digital Britain Report, the Department has been working to ensure the delivery model for the Universal Service Commitment and the Next Generation project is appropriate. We hope to undertake the procurement exercise for the Universal Service Commitment by the autumn. This will help bring broadband access of 2 Mbps to every area in the UK by 2012, including the south-west.

We are aiming to legislate for the Landline Duty in the Finance Bill, and are currently consulting on the use of the Next Generation Fund in order to incentivise the market to deliver next generation broadband to 90 per cent. of UK households by 2017.