The only way to catch up is to embrace free markets

All eyes may be on the Five Eyes response to Britain's decision to let Chinese telecoms giant Huawei provide equipment to our 5G network build, but are we missing the bigger picture? Our country is falling behind, because we've moved from being a free-wheeling and permissive country to one that won't let companies innovate and create without government holding their hand.

Mobile hardware is just the tip of the country's troubles. Not only is the UK nowhere to be seen in the development of this key new hardware, the rollout of this key future technology is already falling behind other comparable countries. If the Government wants the UK to be at the forefront of new technologies, they must entirely change their approach to innovation.

5G is a game-changing technology. It will mean download speeds at least ten times higher than existing 4G technology, enabling movie downloads in seconds, virtual reality live TV and the network backbone for self-driving cars. In the United States, Verizon introduced the first 5G commercial service last October, and AT&T has a service in 19 cities from San Francisco, California to Nashville, Tennessee.

Coverage is also available in South Korea. By comparison, the UK’s first small scale commercial services are not expected to be launched until later this year, and it will be at least several years until it is widely available. Those no-coverage areas in the countryside, and even in our dense inner-cities, are here to stay for quite some time.