Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This would not happen in the areas where the other 23% of the population live.

We set up a procurement model. One of the companies that entered that procurement process was the ESB in partnership with SIRO. For its own reasons, it decided not to proceed with that. We were strongly advised that the best and most cost-effective way to build this network was to build it off the core network that was already there, being able to rent poles and rent ducts, rather than having to build them from scratch. That is the model we proceeded with. If we were to terminate this contract and not proceed with the bidder which is here and start again, in order for the ESB to be considered as eligible to participate we would need to have an entirely new procurement process which could again take two, two and a half or three years to complete. ESB did enter it and for whatever reason it did not proceed.

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