Mr. Ciarán Ó hÓbáin:

Deputy Ó Cuív began and ended with two related questions. I will ask Mr. Neary to come in on point-to-point if he wishes to expand further on what I say about this. I will take the second question first. It was about preclusion from encroachment. There is no prohibition on any commercial operator building anywhere in Ireland. What the mapping exercise sought to do was to understand where commercial operators had high-speed broadband and where they intended to go in order that the State would go only to the remaining areas. That concluded just before the contract was signed in 2019. There is a risk and a reward. If a commercial operator decides to build out in the intervention area, those homes will be connected more quickly to high-speed broadband, potentially, and there will be a risk to the commercial case for the national broadband plan if those homes would cost less to get to but give revenues. However, there is no prohibition.

As to whether NBI could engage with Eir to deal with specific premises, it is in a process at the moment. It could do so only by an open procurement methodology.

It has gone to the market, identified the types of issue where it could seek the assistance of commercial operators, and sought expressions of interest. It is halfway through that process. It has received the expressions of interest at the first phase and is working its way through the process. I cannot say whether the scenario the Deputy outlined will be one of those that NBI could-----