Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The show is over as regards the State having its hands on the levers, so to speak. The Minister went on at length yesterday about what all the private companies are doing, which was not the question I asked. Of course they are. It is dog eat dog. The Minister has named the companies involved. The national broadband plan has become the plaything of the various capital interests involved in it because the Minister has allowed the main infrastructure to be taken over by the private sector.

We have no costings or timeline and we have little or no competition. That is where this process is at now. It is a logistical mess for anyone trying to bid against Eir. It is also a financial and a legal mess. The Minister knows it is complicated because we have not been able to wring a date out of him, even a timeframe of, say, six months in which the procurement process will be completed. He does not know. His officials do not know. God knows we have tried to get answers on that often enough from the Minister. It was to happen this year. Will it happen next year? I do not know.

The Minister keeps talking about the rural electrification scheme. The difference is that, ultimately, the rural electrification scheme was controlled by this House and driven by the people elected to it who had the vision to take a decision. The problem is that this process is now the plaything of international capitalists. The Minister is a bystander, and as someone said earlier, he can cut the ribbon and we can clap or cheer but that is all we can do.

The Minister has lost control of this process. It is a legal mess and I cannot see how it can be unravelled easily. I do not say that lightly. I wish it was not the case. I raised my concerns about that, and I am speaking from my heart. I hate to see a situation where the taxpayer and the State will be strangled in future as a result of this process and left to finance what are the most difficult parts of this country to reach. There will be a disproportionate cost put on the State. It is Joe and Mary taxpayer who will pay the cost of the hard to reach areas. I understand there would always be a cost because there were 840,000 households and premises to be serviced. We in Sinn Féin understand that would need subsidisation. The problem is that the level of subsidisation for those households and premises will be much higher but, even worse, we now have a situation where the international capitalists who have taken it over are the dominant players and they will determine that cost.