IN Guildford, tests have already started on 5G mobile broadband, but many frustrated users in the North-East would just be happy with a reliable 3G signal.

Smartphones and tablets have transformed the way people work.

Being connected to the mobile internet is crucial, especially if you do business online.

But British users are being short-changed.

Mobile phone operators refuse to share their transmitters, a policy known as roaming, leaving users with patchy coverage, especially in rural areas.

This seems to be particularly acute in the North-East, where large swathes of the countryside have poor, or non-existent, signal coverage on some of the biggest networks.

Under new EU rules, from 2016 anyone travelling to Europe will be able to enjoy roaming for free.

That means foreign visitors will enjoy excellent mobile coverage when they come to the UK, because their phones will be able to use the transmitter with the strongest signal, while people living here cannot.

We congratulate the Government on its plans to do something about this anomaly.

Culture Secretary Sajid Javid is discussing a national roaming agreement that will allow customers to swap between networks.

Mobile operators think this is a bad idea.

They claim a roaming agreement will result in more dropped calls, not fewer, as phones hunt for the best signal and hop between transmitters.

But a few dropped calls is preferable to having no signal at all.

Left to their own devices, the UK’s mobile operators have done nothing because they have funded the cost of their networks and do not want to share them – even if it means a better service for the end-user.

This is not acceptable. It is time for the Government to bang some heads together.