Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will bring the section to a conclusion because we could spend all day discussing it. What I and most other people are trying to understand is why the two largest bidders, SIRO and Eir, which have the greatest assets on the ground, pulled out. Has the Minister sought to understand why they did so? Would he give any consideration to the charge that they pulled out because they were of the view that only €500 million had been put on the table by the State and they could not put together a comprehensive business plan that made sense and that protected the assets of their organisations while also making a commitment to roll out high-speed broadband to the 542,000 homes? If so and if that was their understanding and their reason for pulling out, has the Minister any concerns about how it might play out that the one remaining bidder, which has little or no experience and perhaps haphazardly has remained in the race, will now be handed €3 billion, when the two largest players were of the view that all that was available was €500 million? As such, they pulled out, leaving all of us at a significant disadvantage.