Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail)
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19. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources if he will provide a progress update with regard to the Government's commitment to provide fibre broadband to every house and business in County Donegal; the deadline for same; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [16201/15]

Alex White (Dublin South, Labour)
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The National Broadband Plan aims to ensure that every citizen and business, regardless of location, has access to a high quality, high speed broadband service. This will be achieved through a combination of commercial investments and a State led intervention in areas where commercial services will not be provided.

The commercial telecommunications sector is currently investing approximately €2.5 billion in network upgrades and enhanced services with approximately 1.6 million of the 2.3 million premises in Ireland expected to have access to commercial high speed broadband services over the next two years. These very significant investments represent a step-change in the quality of broadband services available.

Last November I published a national high speed coverage map for 2016. This map is available at . The map shows Ireland with two colours, BLUE and AMBER.

The areas marked BLUE represent those areas where commercial providers plan to deliver high speed broadband services by end 2016.

The AMBER area on the map shows the target areas for the State intervention. All premises within the AMBER areas will be included in the State's intervention.

The website also provides information on a county by county basis with a breakdown of coverage across the townlands in every county in Ireland including Co Donegal.

48% of premises in Co. Donegal will have access to commercial high speed broadband services by the end of 2016. The remaining 52% consisting of some just over 52,000 premises will fall within the proposed State led intervention under the National Broadband Plan.

Intensive design and planning work is underway in my Department to produce a detailed intervention strategy for the AMBER area. Following a public consultation process on the draft Intervention Strategy this summer, I hope to move to formal procurement phase towards the end of this year in order to select a preferred bidder or bidders. In accordance with EU State Aid guidelines, the procurement process will be technology neutral.

I anticipate that the first homes and businesses will be connected in 2016 and connections will continue thereafter, with the intention of having all premises connected within a 5 year period.

This complex and ambitious project is a key priority for Government. It aims to conclusively address current connectivity challenges in Ireland.