Liz McManus (Wicklow, Labour)
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Question 204: To ask the Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources his plans to introduce postcodes; if the consultation process has concluded; if he has received a report on the matter; if so, when same will be published; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2129/06]

Noel Dempsey (Meath, Fianna Fail)
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I established a working group comprising people with experience of the postal sector, together with the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government, which is the lead Department for the Irish spatial data infrastructure initiative, to examine the issue of the introduction of a postcode system in Ireland. This group produced its report last year.

Following from the recommendations of the working group report, I asked the Commission for Communications Regulation, ComReg, to appoint project managers to support the postcode project by providing technical and economic advice including assessing the costs and benefits of the introduction of a postcode. ComReg, following a tendering process, has appointed both technical and economic consultants and these are being managed by a national postcode project board, comprising representatives of Departments, together with public and private sector organisations that I appointed last year.

One constituent part of the consultants' work programmes is that they engage in a process of stakeholder consultation with a view to arriving at a postcode model that best meets the needs of the stakeholders and measures the likely costs and benefits of the introduction of such a postcode. An extensive consultation process is currently under way and it is expected that the consultants will present by April next, a proposal to the national postcode project board that describes in sufficient detail, the most appropriate postcode system for Ireland. The board will then present its recommendation to me for my consideration.