Press release

Communications Code complexity creates problems for landowners and risks spreading mobile ‘not-spots'

Aberdeen, 29 April 2025

Rules designed to boost digital access risk creating areas of unreliable coverage and disrupting the property market, say experts. Low returns are prompting landowners to withdraw property from use by phone network infrastructure providers, potentially widening mobile not-spots in urban areas.

Mobile phone networks and their customers rely on sophisticated equipment located on buildings and masts to transmit voice and data around the UK and internationally. For years, rent levels paid to landlords to host this infrastructure was determined by the market; a rough guide being £20,000 - 30,000 a year in London and £15,000 outside.

That changed in 2017 with the introduction of Electronic Communications Code, which aimed to widen public access to digital networks by easing the process by which operators instal, maintain and upgrade their equipment on public and private land. As well as conferring new rights on infrastructure providers, the Code effectively introduced rent controls. Operators now offer up to £5,000 for antennae of rooftops.

Explanations for Britain's poor mobile phone service include tough planning rules, low investment levels and the forced removal of Huawei equipment from the network. But a more compelling factor is the way the Code limits available property for hosting kit, according to Ian Thornton-Kemsley, a recognised expert on the property aspects of telecommunications who is consultant at the independent property adviser Galbraith.

Landlords frustrated by the rules say they're trapped - unable to end leases granted to mobile-phone companies to operate masts, antennae and circuitry on their property, and struggling to agree suitable terms to protect their interests in new agreements. The effect of the legislation is to favour network operators and an emerging class of intermediary investor - called infrastructure providers - at the expense of property owners.

Landlords face multiple problems - unsightly apparatus can reduce building values; equipment owners frequently upgrade equipment without their consent, even when legally required; they often resist landowners in carrying out repair and maintenance, leading to delays, adding costs and interfering with landlords' obligations to their tenants. Such delays add costs and affect property values, adding to financial pain for landlords.

The problem is highlighted by the fact there are some 90,000 telecom sites in the UK, together worth an estimated £240 billion, of which about 23,000 sites are on rooftops.

Problems for landlords are exacerbated by the switch to 5G. The required equipment upgrades are considerably more complex yet frequently, operators fail to address the consequent structural and health and safety challenges. ‘Exclusion zones', mandated for radiation safety in operating 5G, are much greater, affecting rooftop access and extending over adjoining properties. Landlords complain that some operators seek to conceal the extent of these and place the cost of compliance with the health and safety implications on them.

Landlords face the further challenge of being unable to fulfil a growing list of building energy-efficiency requirements due to the siting of rooftop telecoms equipment, potentially frustrating key regulatory upgrades required to be in place by 2030.

Ian Thornton-Kemsley said: "The not-spots that fail phone users in London are starting to appear in other cities and towns in the UK, and for similar reasons.

"The recent case of Gravesham BC -v- OTUK where an operator sought to prevent a Council from addressing water ingress into a block of flats has highlighted issues of telecoms apparatus on rooftops."

Gravesham Council had for some three years had been anxious to effect repairs to prevent water leaking into residential flats below telecom equipment, but negotiations with the operator One Tower UK were unsuccessful. In 2021 the council raised an action to obtain vacant possession under the Landlord & Tenant Act. This was unopposed by OTUK and an order for vacant possession obtained. OTUK then sought to frustrate this by applying for a new agreement under the Code. Gravesham sought to prevent this, was unsuccessful and therefore subsequently appealed to the Upper Tribunal. The appeal was upheld in May 2024.

In a more recent case, Cornerstone Telecommunications Infrastructure Limited ("CTIL"), another infrastructure operator, was granted consent to instal apparatus on a building in Wimbledon, London, despite an intention to redevelop the building for multi-occupational use which would not have been possible with the equipment in place. InCTIL -v- The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Developmentthe Tribunal ordered a minimum term of five years, effectively preventing development of the building for this period. The building will go on the open market shortly and the outcome of any sale is likely to determine the extent of any compensation claim against the operator in terms of the Code.

Mr Thornton-Kemsley cited an urban building being developed for accommodation, where cable running from a plant room containing telecom equipment to antennae on top of the structure poses a fire risk and prevents proper roof covering.

He added: "The costs, both financial and human, of an operator denying a landlord access for some five years to effect repairs or to develop their property to the detriment of their contractual and business operations and the costs in litigating such cases, illustrate the current imbalance, and explain the reluctance of landowners to host electronic communications apparatus at the levels currently being offered."

Photo here:Ian Thornton-Kemsley

Read the latest on energy, renewable energy, utility, telecoms and rural affairs in the latest issue of Galbraith'sEnergy Matters.

Further information:

Galbraith

Media enquiries:

Allerton Communications

About Galbraith

Galbraith is an independent property consultancy employing 240 staff in offices in Scotland and the North of England including Aberdeen, Ayr, Blagdon, Castle Douglas, Cupar, Edinburgh, Galashiels, Hexham, Inverness, Kelso, Morpeth, Penrith, Perth and Stirling, offering local knowledge, national expertise and international reach.

The firm provides the full range of property consultancy services across the commercial, residential, rural, renewable energy, utility and infrastructure sectors. Galbraith is the largest and leading rural consultancy in Scotland and the North of England, managing farm, forestry, land and estate interests on over 3.5 million acres.