Stephen Carter, the new minister for communications, technology and broadcasting has promised to accelerate decision-making in a number of key areas. “Whatever is going to happen to the macro-economy, we can all agree that, in the short- and possibly medium-term, the financial services sector is going to take some time to restructure,” said Carter, in his first interview since taking the job. “So, from a UK plc perspective, this is an important sector and it becomes relatively an even more important sector.”

Carter, the founding chief executive of the media regulator Ofcom, who most recently spent a turbulent 10 months as Gordon Brown’s chief of strategy and principal adviser, will draw together work in existing areas of government and has promised to deliver swift conclusions on a number of pressing issues. These include the future of digital radio, the questions surrounding the next generation of broadband access and mobile phone networks, and the future funding of public-service broadcasting.

His report, Digital Britain, will also consider issues around the digital divide and look into whether there should be a guarantee of universal access to broadband for all consumers. He has promised to deliver a set of recommendations by January.

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