Fergal Browne (Fine Gael)
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I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I have already spoken about this matter in a general debate on communications. This issue will be a hot potato in the years ahead. As we move forward we will be able to receive e-mails, texts, photographs and so on by wireless technology. We will nonetheless pay a price in another respect. In order to do this, we need to have the proper infrastructure in place. The major telecommunications industries are multi-million euro industries. This was brought home to me recently when a nursing home in Carlow had a base station and antennae erected on its roof.

I am sure that the Minister of State would have been involved years ago in protest meetings concerning the erection of phone masts. They are now largely gone and have been replaced by far smaller antennae, which invariably do not require planning permission. There has been a complete revolution in the area of wireless technology. The Government should look at this area again and update the necessary legislation. None of us could have predicted how fast the whole area could have expanded and, in the case in Carlow, the antennae and base station caused great distress to the relatives of those in the nursing home. There were genuine fears on their behalf as to whether there were health risks involved.

The status of a nursing home also needs to be clarified. Is a nursing home a commercial premises or is it a hospital or medical care centre? If it is a hospital, then it should not have any telecommunications equipment attached to it. The Minister of State might claim that this is an area which is dealt with in county development plans, but it is an area where the central Government has a role to play.

ComReg is an independent body which gets funding from the Government annually. The main purpose of ComReg is to inspect sites where antennae and base stations are located and monitor the emissions from them. However, I heard rumours that ComReg ran out of money last October and could not visit sites. I have also heard that it only visits a site once a year. That does not instil public confidence in the system. It is very important that we have an independent body that is properly funded and is in a position to carry out independent audits on sites and check emission levels. ComReg does not have to be legally informed about any new base stations, which is a loophole in the law. It therefore cannot check them for emissions afterwards.

A telecommunications provider such as Vodafone might not notify ComReg about a new station because ComReg will recommend that a number of telecommunications providers share a site. This might not be in the commercial interest of the company involved. Many county development plans recommend sharing sites to cut down on difficulties. However, if Meteor discovers a site that improves the coverage in an area, then its competitors will be keen to access that site as well. Once ComReg is informed, its competitors will seek to gain access to the same site so it is in Meteor's interests not to inform ComReg.

The guidelines issued by planning authorities are also very vague. Telecommunications companies do not have to inform the local authority about their plans to erect antennae or base stations as it is purely a matter of courtesy to do so. There was a farcical scenario in Carlow where we were told the antennae on the base station were turned on, turned off and turned on again. The owners of the nursing home in question and Vodafone were not singing from the same hymn sheet. People who allow their premises to be used to host a base station or antennae get a nice sum of €50,000 every five years. That is quite a lot of money and I am sure that very few of us here would decline such an offer. The Government needs to acknowledge the revolution in wireless technology and bring forward legislation to update it for everyone concerned.

I want to place on the record that I have a mobile phone and I am favour of wireless technology as it is a step forward. However, we need reassurances as well. We cannot have progress in one direction, which may be at the risk of public health.

Batt O'Keeffe (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Senator for raising this issue. Wireless technology is likely to become revolutionary in the unfolding of the information society. It has the capacity to offer access to all of the on-line information services required by an individual without being restricted by wires, connections and sockets. As technology develops these services will become faster, more powerful and truly liberating. I would like to discuss the main developments in wireless technology and outline how this country is up to date in such developments and to show how the public is being kept informed on these matters.

Wireless technology is constantly evolving and is the backbone for services across many sectors including communications, transport, defence, research and emergency services. The demand for wireless services is growing rapidly due to the demand for increased mobility. The European Commission has established a radio spectrum policy group to develop a Europe-wide policy, in which the Department and ComReg participate. Some of the key elements of the policy include developments in technology, markets and regulation. The policy goes beyond electronic communications to transport and research and development. It requires widespread consultation with commercial and non-commercial stakeholders.

Wireless technology underpins mobile services, digital broadcasting and fixed wireless access. Third generation services comprise the principal area of development in mobile technology. Vodafone Ireland announced its pricing details for consumer, rather than corporate, third generation services last Monday. It will launch the services at the end of the month, making it the first mobile operator in Ireland to do so. Digital television broadcasting, which has been launched in a few countries, is under review in Ireland and I would like it to be developed here.

ComReg has issued fixed wireless access licences and modified regulations to make it easier to license new operators. The Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, which recently concluded trials of wireless local area network technology, will publish its findings in a report next month. Wireless technology is one of the technologies used in the metropolitan area networks programme, as part of the phased development of the programme, funded by the Department under the national development plan. Wireless technology is of value as a complementary platform in the delivery of broadband services to remote areas. New market entrants are using fixed wireless networks to connect businesses in metropolitan areas, however. I favour using the most effective technology platforms available and tailoring them to suit the environment in which they will operate.

The Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources has established a website, www.broadband.gov.ie, to keep the public informed of its initiatives in these areas. The consumer advice website has been developed by the Department with the co-operation of the telecommunications industry to help consumers locate the providers of broadband services in their local areas and to compare different products. Consumers can tell the industry where a choice of broadband services is needed by voting for such locations.

There is public concern about the potential health effects arising from the widespread deployment of wireless technology, particularly in mobile cellular networks. The Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources maintains a watching brief on all health matters relating to non-ionising radiation. In its report on telephone masts published in 1998, the Joint Committee on Public Enterprise and Transport concluded that the evidence available to it did not indicate that there was an unacceptable health hazard from telephone masts. A recent World Health Organisation conference yielded no new evidence indicating a link between ill health and non-ionising radiation at the levels set by the guidelines of the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection.

ComReg has put in place a substantial measurement survey programme to ensure that all radio installations in Ireland meet the guidelines. The programme was initiated at the request of the Minister, Deputy Noel Dempsey, and developed in consultation with the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. The survey showed that none of the installations breached the guidelines. The results of the survey are available on the ComReg website, www.comreg.ie, which has a publicly accessible database of cellular base stations to enable the public to determine which operator is responsible for a particular site.

Fergal Browne (Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister of State for his reply. I wish to take up his last point about the ComReg website, which I have visited and found to have good and bad aspects. It is good that it can be searched on the basis of a map of Ireland or by typing in key words. If one wants to check if there is a nursing home in County Donegal with a base station, one can do so by searching through the County Donegal list and typing in "nursing home". One is given a list of places, but it may transpire that they do not all have base stations. All one learns is that there is a base station near the nursing home. That is a weakness in the website. It is a good idea, but it needs to be more specific. When I typed in "nursing home" to search the County Carlow list, I was given a list of places. I telephoned all the nursing homes to find out if they have base stations. The website suggested that there was a telecommunications system at St. Fiach's in Graiguecullen, but the nearest one is at Killeshin, which is approximately two miles away. The website is a step in the right direction, but it could be updated or made more specific. It certainly needs more refinement.

Batt O'Keeffe (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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I will bring the matter to the attention of the relevant Minister.