Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 8 July 2015
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications
Caller Helpline: Samaritans Ireland and Telecommunications and Internet Federation
9:30 am
Mr. Ciaran Moore:
I will take the questions on broadband. We installed a national digital network in 2009 but, as in all such cases, it is now somewhat out of date in terms of the connection speeds for each of our 13 sites around the country. One of the concerns we have around putting in place an extension on the agreement relates to the type of investment that is needed both to handle the increased number of voice calls and the services we deliver over e-mail and messaging services. We have a digital plan to introduce other forms of communication. To some extent, we are looking to invest in the network we have, but that is something we need to plan for over a three- to five-year timescale. It is part of the discussions we are having with the telecommunications companies. We have co-operated very strongly with them on the call charges and they have been very supportive around engineering issues and planning for this type of service. We fund-raise to cover this element ourselves, but we cannot make those business decisions until we know where we are with the call charges.
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