Tim Lombard (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and acknowledge the lengthy statement he made on the national broadband plan. He has covered the main issues. This topic has been debated in the media and other fora in recent weeks. This project is about trying to ensure we have equality of opportunity for rural and urban dwellers. That is what we are trying to promote when we promote broadband. There are about 75,000 properties in my county that have no broadband. That is a major issue in that area and I am one of those people. A lack of access to broadband has a major impact on how society develops and how these communities will develop.

The key reason we put this national broadband plan together was to ensure equality of opportunity for rural and urban Ireland going forward. Let us turn to the matter of the "intervention zone". It is given that name because the private operator running telecom operation since the late 1990s will not expand to those areas where it is not financially viable. That is why the Government has to step in and provide a subsidy to ensure we get that equality of opportunity for those who dwell in rural Ireland. There have been calls for this national broadband plan to be put in place for a long time. Fianna Fáil has been repeatedly calling for this announcement in the last six to eight months. When the plan was announced two weeks ago, that party then ended up not wanting it. That is a bizarre scenario. We need to acknowledge the political game that is under way here.

We are trying to move forward with the plan to ensure the opportunity to which I referred exists for the rural dwellers.There has been a great deal of talk about the significant cost of the plan to the State and the significant investment involved by a private entity. However, for householders and businesses throughout the States, the cost of the service, at some €30 per month, is feasible and practical. That cost will be controlled by a regulator, making the service cost effective and accessible for everybody. Senator Craughwell spoke about the prospect of poor take-up in rural areas. If that issue does arise, the liability will not fall to the State but to the private operator providing the service.

The objective of this initiative is to help us to move forward as a society in a sustainable way. We could, as Fianna Fáil is proposing, postpone the project and put it out to re-tender. However, we heard at a meeting of the Joint Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment this week that a re-tendering process would take 37 months to complete. If I were to go back to my constituents tomorrow and say it will be 37 months before we can move forward with a proposal, which might turn out to be the exact same as what is currently proposed, I can imagine the reaction I would get. The contract with the operator is complex and runs to more than 1,500 pages. It includes provisions to ensure there is equality of opportunity for everyone in society. It will help us to ensure Project Ireland 2040 is delivered, that we have a counterbalance to the east coast, facilitate the development of rural and peripheral areas, give people the opportunity to work from home, and enable smart farming, self-monitoring of health and so on. Broadband is a vital, changing medium that will bring speeds up to 500 Mbps. We are engaged in the coming six weeks in an exchange of views at the communications committee in an effort to achieve clarity on this matter. Next week, in particular, the attendance of the Secretary General of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform should clarify several issues. It is important that we have this debate, after which we must move forward together. The last thing people in rural areas need is political squabbling in place of action to implement equality of opportunity.