On Tuesday, 22nd June 2026, Traighana Smith, Editor of Falklands Radio, interviewed MLA Roger Spink and asked him about the current status of FIG’s telecommunications strategy. Although quite short, it is probably one of the most impactful interviews on Falklands telecommunications since Starlink took centre stage in the dialogue.
For many months, the public debate about the future of telecommunications beyond December 2027, when Sure’s exclusive licence ends, has been conducted largely without substantive public response from FIG apart from a short interview by the Director of Development and Commercial Services on FITV.
Previously, the Connected Falklands Group wrote an open letter to the CEO of the FIG, and OpenFalklands published many posts on the subject. The community has read, shared and engaged in a record number of online page views – more than 35,000 in 2026.
Against that backdrop, what MLA Roger Spink said in his interview with Falklands Radio deserves careful attention. His remarks contained more substantive public information about the future of telecommunications than anything FIG has released over the past six months.
August: The Decision Point
The single most important piece of information in the interview is the confirmation that an Executive Council (ExCo) paper on telecommunications is expected in August 2026. For the first time, a specific month has been attached to the FIG decision-making process. August 2026 is not a distant horizon – it is weeks away. If the ExCo paper arrives as expected and leads to a decision, the period of strategic ambiguity that has characterised the past six months could be coming to an end.
Telecommunications Business Models Under Consideration
According to MLA Roger Spink, the ExCo paper will address the future structure of telecommunications provision in the Falkland Islands. The options he identified, an open tender to a private operator, a joint venture with FIG, or FIG ownership of the assets, will be familiar to regular OpenFalklands readers. These are precisely the models that have been examined in detail on this site since July 2025, most recently in the October 2025 posts on Shaping Falklands Telecoms: FIG’s Possible Path to Ownership and Oversight. The paper will also address whether a formal notice will be served on Sure South Atlantic. It is interesting to consider the use of the word “whether”, implying that notice may not be given in a situation discussed in the previous OpenFalklands post – When Incentives Align: A Speculative Look at FIG and Sure.
That these options are now confirmed as the basis for the ExCo discussion is significant in itself. It suggests that the analytical work undertaken through the CMC process and discussed publicly on OpenFalklands over the past year is helping to directly shape the terms of the decision that FIG is now being asked to make. The community has not been shouting into a void.
The Islanders Deserve More Than a Press Release
Roger Spink also indicated that the ExCo paper will almost certainly remain confidential, on the grounds that it will contain commercially sensitive information, including details about notice. A press release is expected after decisions are made. The community will likely learn what has been decided, but not the full reasoning behind it.
That is understandable up to a point. Some elements of a procurement or negotiating strategy are legitimately sensitive. But confidentiality has its limits, and in this case, those limits matter enormously.
The contrast with previous telecommunications reviews is striking. In 2005, Chris Doyle’s telecommunications report was published. In 2015, the two Cartesian reports were also released. Both contained redactions, as would be expected. Yet neither of the two Cambridge Management Consulting reports completed six months ago in 2025 has yet been published, even in heavily redacted form. A pattern is emerging in which the most consequential strategic decisions about Falklands telecommunications are being made with decreasing public visibility.
The future of the post-2027 telecommunications framework is one of the most significant decisions the Islands have faced in recent years. It will shape connectivity, investment, competition and public expenditure for the next decade and beyond. To suggest that a press release will adequately explain the reasoning behind a decision of that magnitude is, frankly, insufficient.
The community that organised the Starlink petition, engaged constructively with the CMC process, and has followed these developments closely deserves better than an announcement without an argument. When public consultation is announced, sufficient detail about the reasoning that took place behind closed doors must be in the public domain beforehand. Without it, meaningful and considered engagement is simply not possible; islanders cannot ask informed questions about a process they have not been allowed to understand.
It is also worth recalling that a Select Committee was established for the Starlink petition. That process gave the community a formal mechanism to scrutinise, challenge and contribute to a consequential decision. There is no obvious reason why a similar approach could not be adopted here, and every reason why, for a decision of this scale and complexity, it should be.
This is a point I will be making clearly and consistently between now and August.
Endorsement of the Urgency Argument
Perhaps the most striking moment in the interview comes when Roger Spink is asked whether the time elapsed since the Cambridge Management Consulting (CMC) report was completed concerns him. His answer is direct and unambiguous. Yes, it does concern him. He raised the matter with the Acting Chief Executive that morning. And he is concerned because, with every passing day, the Islands continue to pay a very large subsidy to Sure, thereby unnecessarily extending that period. Ongoing compensation payments to Sure are understood to run to several million pounds annually — a direct and growing cost to the public purse that accumulates with every month of delay.
This reflects a concern widely expressed across the community: that delay is not a neutral choice, that it carries a direct and ongoing financial cost to the public purse, and that urgency is not impatience but prudence. Hearing it stated publicly by an elected MLA is significant and suggests the concern about the pace is shared at the level of elected representation. That matters for the political context in which the August ExCo paper will be considered.
Telecommunications Remains a Priority — But Words Are Not Enough
Roger Spink confirms that all five MLAs present at the morning’s discussion see telecommunications as a priority and expressed concerns that progress needs to be made. He also acknowledges, with commendable honesty, that it is easy to declare something a priority, but it is harder to do the work and bring everything together.
That is a fair and self-aware observation. It also contains an implicit challenge. Priority status and expressions of concern are necessary but not sufficient. What the community needs, and what the August ExCo paper must deliver, is a decision, not a further deferral – not a statement of principles, but a clear commitment to a course of action with a timetable attached.
MissionNEX and the Cable Survey: Now Part of the Public Conversation
When asked about the considerable interest in reports concerning an American company proposing a satellite gateway in the Falklands and speculation about possible fibre optic cable surveys linking the Islands with South America, Roger Spink does not dismiss the questions. He acknowledges that FIG receives approaches from a variety of organisations and individuals with ideas for the future, and that those ideas will be taken into account when any tendering process takes place.
That is a careful and measured answer, neither confirming nor denying specific knowledge. But the fact that the question was raised on Falklands Radio, and that MLA Roger Spink chose to engage with it rather than deflect it entirely, confirms that these developments have entered the mainstream public conversation in the Islands.
What Comes Next
The August timeline changes the landscape considerably. If the ExCo paper arrives as expected and leads to a clear decision on notice and the future structure, many of the questions that have been circulating for months will finally have answers, or will at least have a framework within which they can be addressed.
The community that organised the Starlink petition and has engaged constructively throughout the CMC process deserves clarity, and August is now the moment when that clarity should arrive.
If it does not, the questions will not go away. They will simply become more pressing, and the case for a Select Committee stronger.
An Update from Today’s 26th June Penguin News
Today’s Penguin News adds further important context. Reporting on a Standing Finance Committee meeting held on 24 June, the paper confirms that notice has not yet been given to Sure regarding the ending of the exclusive licence. MLA Roger Spink is reported as telling the committee that MLAs had been ‘assured’ that a paper would go to ExCo in August on this topic, though he cautioned that the two-year notice period from the date of termination will take the contract past the current December 2027 end date – a point that has been made consistently on OpenFalklands.
Most significantly, MLA Stacy Bragger stated publicly that he would personally like notice to be served on Sure as soon as possible, while emphasising the need to ensure the Islands are in the best position with a clear plan in place. That is the clearest personal statement of intent on notice from any MLA to date, and it matters for the political context in which the August ExCo paper will be considered.
Chris Gare, OpenFalklands, June 2026, copyright OpenFalklands
