Mr. Fergal Mulligan:

Covid has, undoubtedly, had an impact on the speed of the roll-out over the course of the past 12 months. Since January, National Broadband Ireland, in fairness to it, has set up a new company in very difficult circumstances. It now has more than 170 people working directly for it, with more than 700 working throughout the country. Hiring people in a Covid environment is a feat in itself, given that it started with virtually nobody in January, apart from the 30 or 40 people involved in the bid. It has struggled to meet the demands of Covid, as everybody has, but it has met that challenge pretty well.

Even with the BCP roll-out, islands and GAA halls were shut down and staff could not get in to connect them. That impacted the whole timeline that it had showed us in late 2019. It had to work around all that and, in fairness, did so very well. To answer the question on BCPs, the roll-out is on time and on track. Initially, when the contract was signed, we had an ambition to get 300 of them connected in 2020. That has been achieved, whereby 274 or 275 will be done within the first contract year. The difference between that figure and the 300 is due to local authorities changing ones in and out where site owners decided they did not need one or want one, or that the conditions of getting it did not interest them, or that it was not a suitable site. Things happen.

It is a flexible and dynamic list, which also goes to the Deputy's question about whether it can be changed. It absolutely can be. Where there are good sites that could help the problem of the year five, six and seven roll-out in any particular county, we are all ears, as is NBI, to see whether there is a good site that we can get a connection to that would help those local residents. If there is a reasonable business case for helping people in that regard, the door is open to considering those sites. We will consider it and talk to NBI and the Department of Rural and Community Development about doing that. That Department is the first point of contact with the local authority to engage on those sites. A broadband officer in each local authority engages with local communities, as do the community officers in local authorities. It is through that funnel, into the Department and back to us in NBI, that those BCPs are selected.

The schools are selected by the Department of Education and, therefore, we liaise directly with it. The 690 schools we are targeting for next year comprise every primary school that remains outstanding, so that was an easy choice. As for the selection of who will get what first, we are in discussions with the Department about which schools' resources are really bad, and we are prioritising them. Some schools' resources are really bad, while those of others are not so bad, but they will nonetheless be dealt with in 2021 and 2022.

The BCP programme has gone very well under the conditions that we have faced with Covid-19. We announced only last week the acceleration of the schools project, because many of those 690 schools were not due for another four or five years, so that was a really welcome development. NBI is putting that project plan together and getting its partners involved to get those schools connected, working closely with the Department of Education.

On the Eircode postcodes and whether we have a breakdown of the roll-out, it goes back to my earlier point. For the next 18 months, there is a good level of information on the website. I take the Deputy's point about the language used. Following on from meetings of the previous Oireachtas committee on communications, NBI is conscious of that and now has many people working on how we can communicate better, how the wording can communicate better and how the presentation of the website can communicate better. We have asked for a county-by-county website. We have a national website from NBI but it should be broken down by county. It should show people maps and use language they can understand. That is our ask of NBI, following the ask of the committee at a previous meeting. NBI has many people working on that and I have been told we can expect something on that front in January. Hopefully, something new will be on the website very soon, including different language. I know what an intervention area means because I have been working on the subject for seven years but nobody else knows. NBI needs to be careful about such issues because it is not experts who use the website but rather ordinary people who want to know when they will get broadband.

On the private providers, if somebody who is signed up with, say, Eircom, Westnet or a local Wicklow broadband provider happens to be in contract, that is a discussion between the customer and the provider. Wicklow Broadband, Regional Broadband etc. are some of the 33 providers that are signed up with National Broadband Ireland, which means they want to migrate their customers from the wireless network to the fibre network. They will do that if the consumer wants them to do that. Ultimately, it is for consumers to put their hand up to say that NBI is in their area and that their premises are passed with fibre, and that they would now like fibre connections. The consumer's first port of call is the existing provider, probably to ask whether he or she can be moved to that broadband connection. NBI cannot act in a discriminatory manner and will treat the smallest wireless operators the same as it will treat the largest operator. Under the contract, it cannot differentiate between the two or treat anybody favourably. It has an obligation not to discriminate.

Nevertheless, the answer is "Yes". If someone is tied in to a contract with a wireless provider for a year or two years, there are circumstances where he or she may have to wait until the contract is expired or may have to take the cost of getting out of the contract if he or she really needs fibre. That is just the dynamic of the market and it is what happens throughout Ireland with all the operators. Currently, many people take out one or two-year contracts.

I hope that answered most of the questions.