Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

A large number of houses are being surveyed across the country, including a pocket to the south of Cork city. I again draw the Minister's attention to the fact that, despite the size of Cork, there is nowhere within 40 or 50 miles of that where the service is being delivered. It is similar in north-west, west and east Cork, which makes up one eighth of the country. The national broadband plan is being rolled out but areas such as Lissarda, near Kilmurray, Castletown, Coppeen and Togher have been left without service. Those responsible for the national broadband plan need to get a handle on rolling out into those rural areas much faster and serving communities.

I have outlined to the Minister the situation in regard to the blue zone, where it was expected that broadband would already have been rolled out in commercial areas. I have outlined to the Minister the very slow pace. Heathfield is in phase 3 of construction, people have been living there for 16 months at this stage and Eircode postcodes have been available since the beginning of this year, yet, despite the ducting being available, Eir has not run fibre through it. Eir must be answerable somewhere because when it is raised with ComReg, it is always the case that Eir has provided some sop of an answer about 3 Mbps, which will probably only deliver 1 Mbps. It is not working. Eir needs to be answerable and it needs to roll out the fibre.

Nearby, in Killumney village, again in a blue zone, many people would have expected to have the nearby fibre connected, yet their properties appear as yellow dots on the national broadband plan, which means their connection has been delayed further. People in the blue zone would reasonably expect to have had services rolled out before now. I ask that the national broadband plan would be rolled out more quickly and also that the Minister would raise the issue of the blue zone with ComReg and with Eir to get those areas served more quickly.

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