Peter Burke (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister's reply and the effort the Department is making to invest money in rural Ireland. It is important that we have an action plan and that it be reviewed. That has been very successful in the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and the Department of Education and Skills. It is a very strong template with which to move forward and I commend the Minister for taking the initiative. It is very welcome in terms of the investment by the Government in rural Ireland. However, there are a few areas of concern. While it is welcome that 300,000 houses nationally are now coming under the commercial initiative for broadband, which is a house a minute for the next 90 days and a huge investment in rural Ireland, there are issues in rural parts of my constituency which are not covered by the commercial operators and which depend on the national broadband intervention scheme. There are parts of south Longford, including Legan and Ardagh which I visited with Councillor Paul Ross, where major businesses such as Billy Moran & Sons which are within fractional distance of major broadband areas cannot be connected. They cannot even run credit card machines in their businesses. It is important that we get the plan to intervene for these key areas.

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