Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 14 November 2023
70. Deputy Paul McAuliffe asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications his Department's plans for secure fibre in villages (details supplied) not covered by NBI; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49381/23]
View answerIn December 2022, my Department published Ireland's Digital Connectivity Strategy which supports the ambition outlined in the National Digital Strategy and sets out a number of ambitious targets, including that:
• all Irish households and businesses will be covered by a Gigabit network no later than 2028
• all populated areas will be covered by 5G no later than 2030, and
• digital connectivity will be delivered to all schools and broadband connection points by 2023
These targets will be achieved through commercial operators investing in their networks, complemented by the State’s National Broadband Plan intervention. When taken together, all premises in the State will have access to high-speed broadband in every part of the country no matter how remote.
Commercial operators’ fibre rollouts are progressing at pace. Open eir have already passed over 35,400 homes and businesses in Louth with gigabit services, with plans to pass a further c. 19,000 homes and businesses over the next 2 – 3 years, bringing their total fibre-based investment in the county to over €24m. Other commercial operators are also continuing to increase their network footprint right across Louth with SIRO recently passing over 22,490 premises for full fibre, and Virgin Media passing over 13,580 premises.
I have been advised by my officials that Collon village is part of open eir’s fibre upgrade plan since Q1 2023 and all going well should be fully fibre enabled in the coming 2 years.
Commercial operators will continue work in County Louth, and all counties, over the next three years to complete their fibre rollouts and all efforts are bring made to speed up to the rollout. My Department is working hard with Local Authorities to ensure any barriers encountered by these operators are dealt with quickly through day to day engagement and through the work of the Mobile Phone and Broadband Task force.
Recent ComReg data shows that Quarter 2 of 2023 saw a 7.4% increase in fibre broadband subscriptions compared to the first 3 months of the year, and a 33.7% increase when compared to Quarter 2 of 2022. This demonstrates that take-up of fibre connectivity for homes and businesses is increasing substantially as it is deployed to areas where it had previously been unavailable. The same ComReg data also indicates that c. 40% of homes and business throughout the State now have access to gigabit services through either fibre (576,856) or cable (359,669) infrastructure.
