Telephone Number System (Hansard, 4 February 1997)

§ The Minister of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Fraser of Carmyllie)
My Lords, the Government recognise the importance of the continued availability of telephone numbers to meet the rapid growth in consumer demand. After extensive consultation, Oftel's proposals are designed to provide a balance between stability and flexibility in order to meet customers' needs into the 21st century.

Lord Campbell of Croy
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble and learned friend for his reply. As it was only a few years ago when many numbers were changed, at great inconvenience, and the impression was then given that these would last for a long time; and as changes are expensive for the users, can wider variety be introduced to enable more permutations of reasonable length to be created by using, for example, the alphabet or perhaps, in addition, the better known letters of the Greek alphabet?

§ Lord Fraser of Carmyllie
My Lords, my noble friend is correct. It is about two years since the additional digit was added. Even at that time, Oftel warned that a shortage of numbers would emerge in various parts of the country, including London. After consultation, which has recently been revealed, the general view was that there should be a single telephone code for London. If it had been handled in a different way, two codes would have applied to houses which might have been next door to each other. I envisage that at some point in the future there will be a partial return to the use of what are described as "alpha-numerics" in dialling. However, I regret that the current numerical codes no longer coincide with cities, or parts of them, which I suspect he may recall. I would not be surprised, for example, to see in London at some time in the future the code 020 for Harrods, McDonald's or Pizzaland. However, that is a different approach to the one that I believe my noble friend would like.

§ Lord Peston
My Lords, I know how difficult it is to forecast, and my record is as bad as anyone's. But Oftel's record sets a standard beyond anything almost anyone could conceive. That has imposed enormous costs on both individual households and firms. Unless I misheard the Minister in endeavouring to reassure us, his exact words were that the situation would be so, "into the 21st century". It is only four years to the 21st century, which means that we are going to have this mess again. His noble friend suggested 40 years, which seems to be a fairly reasonable length of time.
1532 As regards the elementary algebra involved, it is about 10 minutes' work to get this matter right. I am not quite sure about the equipment, but I do not believe that a resolution of this matter can be so hard. Oftel has made a terrible mess of this and the rest of us are now being seriously inconvenienced, as will our successors. We should like—and this is what the Minister's noble friend is suggesting—the Government to suggest to Oftel privately that it might do something about it. Is that not reasonable for your Lordships to ask?

§ Lord Fraser of Carmyllie
My Lords, the addition of a further digit opens up something like 9 billion numbers. Therefore, there is no real risk of numbers running out within the United Kingdom for the foreseeable future. However, the problem has not been that there is not a sufficient range of numbers, but that most people wish to have a code which they recognise as applying to their own geographical area. I was seeking to explain the under-estimation that Oftel made that the numbers 0171 and 0181 were going to be used up early in the next century.
The original proposal was to have yet a third code for London. That met with some real resistance. The proposal now is to have a single code, 020, with the other digits following. That seems to be the preferred solution. There are plenty of numbers. As the noble Lord said, it is probably correct that Oftel underestimated the growth in demand for telephone numbers, which have risen from something like 3.5 million in London in 1990 to 7 million by 1997, and I understand that it is anticipated that there will be something like 12 million telephones in London by the first decade of the next century.