Sarah O'Reilly (Aontú) | Oireachtas source

We are now five weeks from Storm Éowyn and while ESB crews worked tirelessly to restore power, broadband services remain in total disarray. Many people across Cavan and Monaghan are still without a connection for broadband, landlines and network coverage. People are completely stranded, especially those working from home and those whose livelihood depends on connectivity. I will take the example of a family in my constituency who recently brought home their newborn baby. What should be a time of celebration is consumed with anxiety and stress, as they have to drive 10 km to an out farm because they cannot access their calving camera.It might sound like a small thing to us, but it is extremely frustrating for them. They are not alone. Many rural areas already suffer from poor mobile phone networks, making landlines and broadband essential, yet broadband providers are nowhere to be found. There is no customer service, no accountability and no urgency to restore services.

People are looking to the Government for help. They feel ignored and badly let down. I invite the Minister to drive around Cavan and Monaghan and see for himself the appalling state of communications infrastructure there - Eir lines holding up falling trees, cables drooping dangerously low and dangling along ditches, and thousands of poles like little leaning towers of Pisa. The damage is so obvious, with no sign of a provider service crew. How is this acceptable? Broadband providers seem to be answerable to nobody.

If this were Dublin, it would be sorted in days. Why is rural Ireland being left behind again and again? I call on the Minister for communications, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, and the Minister of State, Deputy Alan Dillon, to hold broadband providers to account. There should be no more excuses, no more evading answers and no more delays. People have already waited five weeks.