Joe McHugh (Donegal North East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Go raibh maith agat, a Leas-Chathaoirligh. I thank the Senator for tabling the question. Broadband is a subject close to my heart and he is right that Donegal faces the same challenges as Kerry. I welcome the opportunity to address the Seanad on this matter.

The State only intervenes in the competitive telecommunications market where there is evidence of clear market failure and such intervention is always subject to EU state aid approval. The national broadband scheme was one such intervention.

Let me be clear on this matter, there is no question of services being withdrawn following the ending of the scheme. 3 has confirmed that, following the expiry of the scheme, it will continue to provide coverage throughout national broadband scheme areas on a commercial basis, and that customers should see no change to the level of service or speeds provided by 3. It has also announced plans to extend 4G coverage across all of the NBS coverage areas within the next three years offering significantly faster mobile broadband speeds.

I understand that former NBS customers who choose to stay with 3 can avail of the same choice of broadband plans and tariffs as those offered by it in non-NBS areas. Furthermore, there is now a choice of commercial operators offering broadband services over a diverse range of technology platforms throughout much of the area previously covered by the NBS.

Through the national broadband plan, the Government aims to ensure that high speed broadband is available to all citizens and businesses in Ireland. This is being achieved through a combination of commercial investment and the development of a State-led intervention for non-commercial areas.

The commercial sector is currently investing approximately €2.5 billion in new infrastructure and services. These investments are delivering high-speed broadband to homes and businesses across Ireland for whom low speeds would have been the norm just two years ago. The pace of investment is encouraging and is having tangible impacts on communities across Ireland.

The Government has made clear its intention to ensure that all citizens and businesses can access high-speed services, regardless of where they are located. The national broadband plan, therefore, aims to supplement the significant commercial investments with a State-led intervention in the areas where commercial investment is not forthcoming.

The Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources is currently finalising a mapping exercise which will identify the precise areas of commercial investment and those areas that require a State-led intervention. The Minister and I intend to publish a series of interactive maps later this year for public consultation where operators and citizens can give feedback, with a view to ensuring that we correctly identified all of the areas requiring intervention. These maps will be dynamic and subject to change as future commercial investments are announced or rolled-out.

Publication of the maps represents an important milestone in the overall project. It will feed into a detailed implementation strategy which will be of published in 2015, in tandem with an application for EU State aids approval. The detailed plan will be the subject of a full public consultation and we will move quickly thereafter into formal procurement for a winning bidder or bidders to build the network.

The proposed State-led intervention will involve a substantial network build-out which will be capable of carrying even higher broadband speeds, as new and more bandwidth-demanding services emerge. It will extend to locations in every county in the State identified as having no current or planned high speed network.

This challenging programme is being progressed as a priority project within my Department. The national broadband plan, which is being progressed in stages, will deliver quality, high-speed connectivity to meet the needs of present and future generations in all parts of Ireland.