Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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394. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the budget allocation for the national broadband plan in each of the years 2016, 2017 and 2018. [50950/17]

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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402. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the amount his Department has spent on the national broadband plan in each year since 2011. [50995/17]

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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403. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the amount his Department has allocated to the national broadband plan for 2018. [50996/17]

Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 394, 402 and 403 together.

The Government's National Broadband Plan (NBP) aims to ensure high speed broadband access (minimum 30 megabits per second) to all premises in Ireland, regardless of location.  The NBP has been a catalyst in encouraging investment by the telecoms sector so that today over 65% of the 2.3m premises in Ireland have access to high speed broadband and this is set to increase to 77% (1.8m premises) by the end of 2018 and to 90% (2.1m premises) by the end of 2020.  The NBP is being achieved through a combination of commercial investment and a State led Intervention in those areas where commercial investors acting alone will not provide this essential service.  The State Intervention is the subject of an ongoing procurement process.

On 29 September 2015 the Government agreed on and published its 6 year Capital Plan, Building on Recovery, which included an allocation of €275m for the State led Intervention under the NBP. This provides the initial stimulus required to deliver the Government's intervention.  Funding of €75m has also been committed through the European Regional Development Fund.

Further funding will be required over the lifetime of the proposed 25 year contract to build, maintain and operate the broadband network in the State Intervention Area.  In this regard, the Programme for a Partnership Government (PfG) notes that Government will provide additional Exchequer capital, if needed, to deliver on the commitment to bring next generation broadband to every house and business in the country.

The budget allocation for the Department's work to deliver the State led Intervention for the time period requested is set out in the following table.

The NBP was launched in December 2012, and expenditure in respect of the State led Intervention therefore dates from 2013.The expenditure to date is set out in the following table.

My Department has allocated €15 million to the Department's work on the State led Intervention for the NBP for 2018.

The procurement process being managed by the Department's specialist NBP team is a complex one and it is important that it is adequately resourced to ensure efficiency, robustness and transparency.However, delivering connectivity to the 542,000 premises that fall within the State led intervention under the NBP remains a Government priority.