Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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524. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the way in which the works carried out by a company (details supplied) to date in the context of the national broadband plan will be completed and-or remedied; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6860/18]

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. Today 7 out of 10 of the 2.3 million premises in Ireland have access to a high speed broadband service.  Within a year that number will rise to nearly 8 out of 10 premises and by 2020, 9 out of 10 premises or 90% of premises. This goal will be achieved by a combination of commercial investment and a State led intervention.

Part of that commercial investment is a commitment by eir to rollout high speed broadband to 300,000 premises in rural Ireland by the end of this year. In April 2017, I signed a Commitment Agreement with eir in relation to this rural deployment. Information on eir's rural deployment is available at . A copy of the Commitment Agreement is available on my Department’s website www.dccae.gov.ie.

Although deployment figures for Q4 2017 have not yet been verified by my Department’s teams, I understand eir has passed a total of 121,000 premises to date.

Although eir recently withdrew their tender from the ongoing procurement process for the National Broadband Plan State led intervention, eir has reconfirmed its commitment to the ongoing rural deployment as well as its ongoing investment in broadband nationally and I welcome this.