Mobile phone engineers found ‘weapons’ at the site - and had to remove the mast.

A temporary mast has been erected in Lancaster city centre in a bid to help solve the ongoing mobile phone issues for residents.

Repeated attacks of vandalism by gangs of youths caused Vodafone (VodafoneThree) to remove a key mobile mast site in Lancaster in April.

Vodafone engineers found ‘weapons’ at the site as well as it being vandalised.

Last summer Vodafone said they were aware of the ongoing issue with their 2G, 4G and 5G service.

A temporary phone mast has been erected in Lancaster.

placeholder image — A temporary phone mast has been erected in Lancaster.

And in December, Lancaster MP Cat Smith said she had been told by Vodafone that their city centre site had continued to be vandalised and their engineers could not fix the mast until the area was secure.

Lancaster City Council had helped in pressing the owners for action on securing the site, and jail gates had been installed, so that Vodafone's network team could proceed with a survey to get the site back online.

The mast, on top of a derelict building in Fenton Street in Lancaster, was subsequently taken offline.

But in August, VodafoneThree said they had come up with a temporary solution to the problem.

Lancaster MP Cat Smith said she was still working to find a permanent solution.

She said: ”Just over a year since the Vodafone (and o2) mast was vandalised, I have been working hard pulling together telecom companies, local building owners and council planning team, and I'm pleased to update you that a new mast has been installed in the central area of Lancaster - which is now live!” “Over the past couple of weeks Vodafone, Three, and o2 customers should hopefully have seen some improved signal reliability as the mast services these networks.

“Sadly no! mobile internet coverage in the UK is worse than any EU or G7 country, and the difference between indoor and outdoor signal can fluctuate hugely.

"I'm already working with infrastructure providers, telecom companies, and other city centre building owners both public and private, trying to get a permanent fix to this historically poor signal."