Michael McCarthy (Cork South West, Labour)
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987. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources when fibre broadband will be rolled out to an area (details supplied) in County Cork; and when local residents in this area will be able to access the Internet through a high-speed broadband connection. [19927/15]

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 is being achieved through a partnership between Government and commercial telecommunications companies.

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 areas marked BLUE represent those areas that will have access to commercial high speed broadband services by end 2016.

The AMBER areas show the target areas for the State intervention.

Based on information provided by commercial operators, 99% of the townland of Dunmanway North will be covered by the commercial sector. The remaining 1% of Dunmanway North will be part of the State intervention. Members of the public should consult the map to establish for themselves the precise location and status of their individual premises.

More generally I can confirm that next generation broadband services have been rolled out to over 118,000 premises to date in Co Cork with a further 64,000 expected to be served over the next 18 months. The remaining 86,000 premises in Co Cork are the target for the proposed State 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.

I expect the physical build of the network to begin in late 2016, and it will take between three and five years to fully complete–depending on the details of the bid or bids selected.

This complex and ambitious project is a key priority for Government and aims to conclusively address current broadband connectivity issues in mainly rural parts of the country.