Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 10 February 2022

Public Accounts Committee

2020 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications
National Broadband Plan Expenditure and Related Matters

9:30 am

Mr. T.J. Malone:

I will take that one, if that is okay. We are definitely acutely aware of the marketplace, where we are in the market at present and that the level of unemployment is dropping at all times. We have gone out to all our contractors over the past six or eight months and looked at what availability of resources they would have in the event we want to up our production levels, number one and number two, if an accelerated programme was feasible for us down the road. We have got that detail back.

In addition, to try to circumvent this and get ahead, which is no different than what we did in the procurement of materials, where we forward bought for three years and increased the stockholding at any one time, we have added another subcontractor in recent weeks and months to the panel we can choose from. That particular contractor has strong links into European countries that are possibly coming off the back of some of these projects so there is more availability of labour. We are looking at adding three more contractors to that panel at present. Again, one of those also has international links. We are constantly looking at that. The existing contractors are telling us they will be able to ramp up to meet the demands but, in order to be sure of it, we are being prudent by adding additional contractors to the list.