On 23rd October 2024, the Bishop of St Albans asked a question about enhancing rural connectivity to increase rural productivity and promote rural sustainability:
The Lord Bishop of St Albans: My Lords, a recently published economic report by Pragmatix has identified the extraordinary gap between urban and rural productivity, including on homeworking, exacerbated by the problem of rural connectivity. Is the Minister aware of some of the local solutions that are now being tried? We are involved in some of those, for example with hosting antennae in church spires and towers and bouncing signals into more remote areas to enable homeworking and to increase productivity. Would he be willing to support some of these important initiatives for the sake of rural sustainability?
Lord Livermore (Lab, Treasury): It is an interesting question, and the answer is yes, I would be very willing to look at those impacts. As we have been discussing, labour supply has impacts across the economy. In rural areas, where sometimes it is difficult to travel into work, being able to work from home and the ability to have fast-speed internet connections can make a massive difference, and I would be more than happy to look at those issues.
The Church of England in Parliament 
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