Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I have in my hands the massive bundle of documentation sent to us at 1.55 p.m. today about the national broadband plan. That illustrates the sharp practice of Government in its management and handling of this project from the start and its attempts to spin its way out of any serious questions or accountability about the project itself. None of this was produced yesterday. Very little of the detail in this documentation was released yesterday. The Government was definitely endeavouring to get out of Leaders' Questions without the detail of this documentation being in the public domain. The wider issue is that if one looks at the correspondence from the Secretary General of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform to the Government and the Minister, he states:

In terms of the long-term sustainability of the project, I believe that there are unprecedented risks to the Exchequer posed by this proposed project. The Government is being asked to commit up to €3 billion of Exchequer funding - up to €2.275 billion of which will be required by 2026 - in an area where technology is rapidly changing and where we face a number of significant risks to the successful completion of the project.

The correspondence continues:

As against this €3 billion Exchequer investment that is at risk, the private sector operator is only risking [REDACTED] of their own funds.

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