Vol. 562 No. 4
116 Mr. Broughan asked the Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources if the Government's plans for the information society, as outlined in the report, New Connections, of February 2003, are being affected by his Department's approach to broadband infrastructure and competition in the telecommunications sector; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6393/03]
My Department's activities in the area of providing broadband infrastructure and services are a key element of the Government's plans for the development of the information society, as outlined in the report, New Connections. The widest possible availability of competitive services, including the widespread availability of affordable broadband access, has traditionally been an important objective of Irish telecommunications policy.
While the provision of communications infrastructure and services is a matter for the private sector companies that operate in the fully liberalised telecommunications market, my Department has undertaken a number of initiatives to accelerate and promote investment in telecommunications infrastructure. These investments will enhance the potential for the development of electronic commerce facilities and enable the electronic provision of public services, including education services, virtual libraries and welfare and health services.
In 1999, 13 projects rolling out broadband infrastructure nationwide to a value of €70 million were supported and are now completed. Under the National Development Plan 2000-2006, approximately €200 million was allocated under the two regional communications and e-commerce measures. To date, ten private sector contracts have been signed under the plan. Projects funded include the construction of a new national fibre-optic backbone by ESB Telecom, the development of regional e-commerce centres by Energis, the extension by Esat of its national network and the acceleration of the Esat and Eircom roll-out of DSL. My Department is also funding the construction of open-access metropolitan area fibre-optic networks in more than 19 towns and in the Liberties-Coombe area of Dublin to facilitate the provision by the private sector of advanced communications services to consumers, educational establishments and business. It is expected that these projects will be completed progressively over the next two years at a cost in the region of €60 million. Construction of networks has commenced in Cork and Galway and will commence shortly in Mayo. Further projects will commence once contracts have been completed, about which I will let the House know.
There have also been some recent significant regulatory developments to improve access to the information society.
Additional informationOn 21 February 2003 I issued policy directions to the Commission for Communications Regulations in accordance with section 13 of the Communications Regulation Act 2002. They focus on a number of key policy priorities for the commission in the short to medium term, including the introduction of flat-rate Internet access. These policy directions, together with a report on the public consultation process, have been published on my Department's website. The text of the policy directions, together with the reasons for their introduction, have also been published in Iris Oifigiúil in accordance with the Communications Regulation Act 2002.
A Fine Gael Deputy referred to a table that ranks Ireland 51st in the world in its level of broadband infrastructure. The OECD report, referred to by the Minister last year, placed Ireland 27th out of 30 and a recent Dublin Chamber of Commerce report placed Dublin city in the bottom division of nations in the area of broadband provision and on-line availability. More recently, the chairperson of the Joint Committee on Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, Deputy O'Flynn, gave me a copy of the global information technology report 2002-03 which is a highly regarded report on Internet readiness and the role of e-commerce in society. This report places Ireland 21st behind such countries as Singapore, Taiwan, Korea and Hong Kong.
Given the Government parties' election promise to have the entire country on a fast broadband system by 2005, is it not the case that negative reports by external monitors show that the Government needs to do better? It seems that the Government has announced the MAN network for each of the 19 towns involved on an individual basis. In order to provide an always-on, fast broadband network, the Government should be delivering to the 123 towns earmarked in the national development plan rather than just the largest 19. Is it not the case that the Government has, to date, signally failed to get to grips with broadband infrastructure?
The Minister has directed the Commission for Communications Regulation with regard to flat-rate Internet access for the FRIACO development later this summer, but is this not too little too late? This issue is critical to our economic progress and must be addressed in the months ahead. I was astonished to hear the Minister of State at the Department of the Taoiseach, Deputy Hanafin, tell us there is no e-procurement procedure in place. One of the key elements of her responsibilities is to create an e-procurement development for the Government, but it has not happened. In fact, the Minister of State said there was no such thing.
The time for this question has expired. The Minister must be given an opportunity to respond.
It is ridiculous to claim that the Government is on top of this problem.
Some of the reports and statistics to which the Deputy refers are a couple of years old. The roll-out of broadband this year and next will dramatically increase our position and rating in that regard and we are one of the leaders into research on wireless technology.
It is ironic that the Labour Party is criticising the Government, given that the party only mentioned broadband once in its pre-election documents, in which it said that its national spatial strategy document would refer to broadband and how it would be rolled out. We are still waiting for that document. At least my party had a fully-fledged and dedicated document in which we promised the type of policy we would implement if returned to Government.
Until I mentioned FRIACO, neither Deputy Broughan nor Deputy Coveney seemed to know what it was. I am taking initiatives in relation to FRIACO and driving DSL and other access rates down. Aligned to this, is better connection through wireless LAN and the roll-out under the previous and current national development plans through which ESAT and Eircom received significant amounts of taxpayers money in order to roll out broadband. As a result of all of this, Ireland will soon be at the top of the league table in regard to broadband connectivity.
