Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I have a case which is typical, I think, of what we have talked about but which is a specific and quite interesting one. In this case NBI advises that the connection date is January 2025. The person concerned then went to Eir. What they are getting at the moment is a service of between 0 Mbps and 8 Mbps and it is costing €69 a month. The Eir engineers have confirmed that there is a fibre broadband pole only 125 m away from the premises. The person has given me the number of the pole, which I will not read out because it might identify where they are or who they are. A neighbouring house - I have the Eircode postcodes of the premises - is connected to fibre broadband.

These are my questions. Can NBI ask Eir to deal with this case and cases like it, rather than waiting for the big NBI build-out? Second, unless NBI does ask Eir, is Eir precluded from encroaching on the NBI area? My understanding was that it cannot encroach since it got a last chance saloon to say what it would cover commercially and then it was not allowed to cherry-pick after that. Is it the case that NBI could ask Eir but that Eir cannot just unilaterally walk in and say it has changed its mind, there is bigger pick-up and it will cover the area? I have two other points on that. The point-to-point solution would seem to be a possibility in such cases, going to the nearest house and asking whether point-to-point will be allowed. Can the witnesses confirm that?

I have one final question. I have dealt with cases - and the Department has been helpful, in fairness - in which areas that were included in the Eir or in the commercial roll-out were, as Mr. Neary said, subsequently found not to be getting a 30 Mbps service and were transferred to NBI. If NBI is taking those extra houses on board, is there any chance it could offload a similar number of houses adjacent to Eir areas back to Eir and get them done by Eir in order that NBI and the State would not wind up with an extra load and that what the Department was told would be covered would be covered by a swap basis?

There are basically three questions there. I look forward to getting the list of the marts and the criteria by which they were selected.