Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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1271. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment when a company (details supplied) in County Meath can expect to have good quality and reliable broadband; and his views on whether existing poor broadband is severely affecting the ability of businesses to achieve their targets. [54899/17]

Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
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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 67% 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.In April I published an updated High Speed Broadband Map which is available at www.broadband.gov.ie. This map shows the areas targeted by commercial operators to provide high speed broadband services and the areas that will be included in the State Intervention Area under the National Broadband Plan (NBP).

The Map is colour coded and searchable by address/eircode:

- The  AMBER areas represent the target areas for the proposed State led Intervention under the NBP and are the subject of an ongoing  procurement process. 

- The BLUE represents those areas where commercial providers are either currently delivering or have plans to deliver high speed broadband services. 

- The Light BLUE areas represent eir's commercial rural deployment plans to rollout high speed broadband to 300,000 premises by the end of 2018 as part of a Commitment Agreement signed with me last April.

The premises of the company referred to by the Deputy is in an AMBER area. 

My Department is in a formal procurement process to select a company or companies who will roll-out a new high speed broadband network in the State intervention area. That procurement process is now at an advanced stage.  “Detailed Solutions” submitted by two bidders last September are being evaluated by the NBP specialist team. The next stage in the procurement process is the receipt of final tenders followed by the appointment of a preferred bidder(s) and contract signature.

My Department will engage with the winning bidder(s) to ensure the most efficient deployment as part of the contract.

I recognise the importance of availability of high speed connectivity for all businesses in Ireland and the frustration for those that do not currently have access to this level of connectivity.  The NBP state led intervention will play an integral role in revitalising businesses across provincial towns and rural Ireland. It will allow rural businesses, such as small enterprises and family farms, to operate and do business on-line as required. Delivering connectivity to the 542,000 premises that fall within the State led intervention under the NBP remains a Government priority.

In the interim, practical initiatives will continue to be addressed through the work of the Mobile Phone and Broadband Taskforce to address obstacles and improve connectivity in respect of existing and future mobile phone and broadband services.

Under this Taskforce, engagement between telecommunications operators and local authorities through the Broadband Officers is continuing to strengthen.  These Broadband Officers are acting as single points of contact in local authorities for their communities.  The appointment of these officers is already reaping rewards in terms of ensuring a much greater degree of consistency in engagements with operators and clearing obstacles to developing infrastructure.  There is a link to a list of these local Broadband Officers on my Department's website.