Mary Moran (Labour)

I welcome the announcement made yesterday by the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Pat Rabbitte, and Minister for Education and Skills, Deputy Ruairí Quinn, that all second level schools will have access to high speed broadband by 2014 and it will be available in 200 schools from September 2012. As an educator, I have long campaigned for efficient, high speed connectivity to be available in all school classrooms. When I left my classroom last May, not only did I not have high speed Internet access but I did not have any Internet access. The promises made by the previous Government on foot of great ideas contained in various reports on investing in broadband in schools in the period from 2008 to 2013 never materialised.