Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 25 April 2018
44. Deputy Timmy Dooley asked the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the status of the national broadband plan; the date by which the contract will be awarded; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [18032/18]
Amharc ar fhreagra46. Deputy James Lawless asked the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the status of the national broadband plan; the date on which the contract will be awarded; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [17966/18]
Amharc ar fhreagraI propose to take Questions Nos. 44 and 46 together.
The Government's National Broadband Plan (NBP) aims to ensure high speed broadband access (minimum 30 megabits per second) to all premises in Ireland, regardless of location. The NBP has been a catalyst in encouraging investment by the telecoms sector. Today, almost 7 out of 10 of the 2.3 million premises in Ireland have access to high speed broadband. Since this Government came into office almost 400,000 additional premises have access to high speed broadband. This will increase to nearly 8 out of 10 premises by the end of this year and by 2020, 9 out of 10 premises will have access to a high speed broadband connection. This is being achieved via a combination of commercial investment and a State led intervention.
In April 2017 I published an updated High Speed Broadband Map which is available at www.broadband.gov.ie. This map shows the areas targeted by commercial operators to provide high speed broadband services and the areas that will be included in the State Intervention Area under the NBP.
The Map is colour coded and searchable by address/eircode:
- The AMBER areas represent the target areas for the proposed State led Intervention under the NBP and are the subject of an ongoing procurement process.
- The BLUE areas represent those areas where commercial providers are either currently delivering or have plans to deliver high speed broadband services.
- The LIGHT BLUE areas represent eir's commercial rural deployment plans to rollout high speed broadband to 300,000 premises.
There are over 2.3 million premises in the State. Approximately 540,000 fall within the AMBER area. Over 1.6 million premises are in a BLUE area and approximately 180,000 are LIGHT BLUE.
In April 2017, I signed a Commitment Agreement with eir in relation to its plans to provide High speed broadband to 300,000 premises in rural areas on a commercial basis. eir has committed to completing the rollout by the end of this year. Information on eir's planned rural deployment is available at http://fibrerollout.ie/eircode-lookup/. A copy of the Commitment Agreement is available on my Department’s website www.dccae.gov.ie.
Quarterly updates on eir's rural deployment are published on this website. eir has passed a total of 121,000 premises as of December 2017. Figures for Q1 2018 are expected to be published in May.
My Department is in a formal procurement process to select a company who will roll-out a new high speed broadband network in the State intervention area. That procurement process is now in its final stages. My Department will engage with the successful bidder on the most efficient rollout of the network.
In the interim, practical initiatives will continue to be addressed through the work of the Mobile Phone and Broadband Taskforce to address obstacles and improve connectivity in respect of existing and future mobile phone and broadband services.
Under this Taskforce, engagement between telecommunications operators and local authorities through the Broadband Officers is continuing to strengthen. These Broadband Officers are acting as single points of contact in local authorities for their communities. The appointment of these officers is already reaping rewards in terms of ensuring a much greater degree of consistency in engagements with operators and clearing obstacles to developing infrastructure. There is a link to a list of these local Broadband Officers on my Department's website.
