Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 15 September 2021

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport

Business of Joint Committee
Update on National Broadband Plan: National Broadband Ireland

Mr. T.J. Malone:

It has been very successful so far. We are working with the contractors in respect of three areas: the ongoing work; the recovery of the seven-year plan; and to see where we are positioned from an acceleration point of view to bring that back in. We are confident we can get back the six months we have lost within the seven years of the plan. We are working with them in granular detail on what a deployment plan would look like and what resources they can make available.

Taking that into account, and as Mr. Hendrick said earlier, 2022 is kind of banked now. The figures we are looking at for 2022 are there, so any incremental decrease on the seven-year plan timeframes would take effect from the end of 2022 or from 2023 onwards. That gives us time to work with the contractors to source those additional crews and that different capability. We have seen some programmes around Europe - fibre commercial city programmes rather than rural programmes - finishing off. In Portugal and places like that, the contractors are engaging with individuals and other contractors from those countries and getting great success in bringing them across as well.