Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate. In addition to the work of the Joint Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment, the Committee of Public Accounts also did work on the NBP and its forerunner the metropolitan area network, MAN, contracts. The main concern is how the State will fund the system and if, when complete, it will be handed over to a private entity. While we initially were told that the cost would be approximately €500 million, the cost has escalated to in the region of €3 billion, which is a small fortune.

As a country, we are, or could be, heavily subsidising the construction of a network that the private sector will own. I refer to an observation by the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform on the draft memorandum to Government on the national broadband plan. It refers to a contingent subsidy for encroachment, but the figures are redacted. I have been told that this is likely to mean that where the provider in place is tasked with providing broadband to an area that later becomes part of the intervention area, the provider will be entitled to a subsidy because of encroachment. The Minister might address that point. If that is the case, we need to know the amount set aside for such a subsidy.

Even though there was always only one bidder, the make-up of that bidder has changed substantially and it is difficult to figure out who exactly is involved. Enet was involved, as was Granahan McCourt. It is worth noting that when Enet managed the MANs contract, several complaints were made about the lack of transparency in pricing. During that time, we had some of the most expensive broadband in Europe, as set out in the Analysys Mason report. Can the State afford to heavily subsidise infrastructure only to hand it over to a private entity, the sole concern of which will be profit margins? What will be the cost of broadband to the people who want to take it up? It is worth noting that the Secretary General of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, Mr. Robert Watt, described this as an unprecedented risk for the State given the amount of public funding being tossed around, with no guarantees in regard to value for money. He said he found it difficult to believe that a convincing case could be made for this project. He went on to list a number of key infrastructure projects that would not be delivered as a result of proceeding with the NBP in its current format. This may well impact on rural Ireland. It may be that some projects will not be delivered on foot of the delivery of a service that is way more expensive than it needs to be and that we may not own. We have to look at this in the round. It is unusual for somebody in Mr. Watt's position to be so forthcoming with his views. It is essential we do not ignore that.

Potentially, we are being bounced into something that now looks as though it will cost billions rather than hundreds of millions because we are supposedly too far into a flawed process. The Department has to question itself about how we could have ended up in a situation where there is only one bidder. That does not lead to an optimum outcome. The Social Democrats brought a motion to the House, which was passed, that the national development plan be reviewed. There have been massive overruns on the national children's hospital. The amount projected for the national broadband plan was not anything like the amount it is being projected to cost now. We have also declared a climate emergency and we really need to reconfigure our priorities in that context. We can only spend money once. If this is the amount it will cost, we need to look at the national broadband plan and be honest about what cannot be done if we go ahead with it as proposed.

We got a number of assurances about the amount of information that would be given to the Dáil in advance of signing any contract. What we are hearing now seems to be deviating from that. Can the Minister give us an assurance about what we are going to see? Will there be a Dáil vote in advance of the signing of any proposed contract? I also have a concern about how much due diligence has been done in respect of the entities involved. Should this proceed, we certainly do not want to be back here doing an inquiry and saying we were told this and it did not work out. We have to be given absolute assurances. I hope this motion will pass and that we will have a publicly-owned network. We need to be absolutely assured about the due diligence in respect of the entities involved.

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