Mairead Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

162. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment his views on the excessive use of different legal entities and vehicles which has increased legal, accounting and other costs in relation to the funding, ownership, control and corporate structure of National Broadband Ireland (details supplied); and his views on whether restrictions should be applied on the number of layers that can be used in such a corporate structure. [2515/22]

Ossian Smyth (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

The National Broadband Plan (NBP) contract, which was signed with National Broadband Ireland (NBI) in November 2019, is a comprehensive and detailed document. To protect the State’s investment and to ensure that the NBP milestones and deliverables are met, the contract was designed to include extensive protections, quality checks, reporting and monitoring obligations.On the matter of ownership of NBI, Metallah Limited is the 100% owner of the shares in the capital of NBI, save for the special share of the Minister, which does not provide ownership rights. While there are other legal entities in the structure, I am advised that this is common practice to facilitate investment in large scale critical infrastructure projects of the scale of the NBP.

NBI is required to deliver key specific delivery milestones before subsidy claims can be submitted. Subsidy payments, relating to capital costs, can only be drawn down once these milestones are fully achieved and independently verified.

The ownership structure remains as it was at the signing of the contract with NBI.I am satisfied that the governance structure put in place through the NBP contract and by my officials will provide the necessary oversight to manage the contract and to ensure NBI’s compliance with its contractual obligations, including those regarding ownership.