Tim Lombard (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I wish to discuss mobile phone and broadband coverage in rural Ireland. A report was published yesterday morning by the Ministers at the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Deputies Denis Naughten and Seán Kyne, on the task force launched after the Government was formed to improve mobile phone coverage throughout Ireland. The task force brought together, for the first time, all of the key operators such as ComReg and the local authorities. One of its key findings was that no map had been made of the black spots in rural Ireland. I welcome the Minister's initiative to map all such areas. Last year he put in place a pilot programme to map black spots in counties Donegal, Roscommon, Sligo and Kerry and has now moved to other local authority areas. Mobile phone coverage is one of the most important pieces of infrastructure for which people are looking and this is an important stop to ensure we will have adequate coverage. Local authorities have a broadband officer to ensure this mapping will happen and solutions must be found with ComReg and the providers.

I concur with Senator John O'Mahony in his views on the Citizens' Assembly. It is disturbing to read that there was such a way of picking people to sit in such an important assembly. It is important we have an open debate to discuss what happened and how the membership was gathered in the past few years. Some 53 people have moved off it and we need to know how they have been replaced. As the stories on how they have been replaced are very disturbing, it is important to really examine what has happened. If we do not have clarity, there will be a fear that the assembly's recommendations in the past few years might not have been as transparent as they should have been.