Written answers

Thursday, 15 December 2022

Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment

National Broadband Plan

Photo of Bernard DurkanBernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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95. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the extent to which he proposes to augment the provision of high-speed, high-quality broadband in all areas throughout the country, urban and rural without exception with particular reference to meeting the most obvious requirements in the shortest possible time; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [62734/22]

Photo of Bernard DurkanBernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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166. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the extent to which ongoing progress can be reported in regard to the provision of high-speed modern broadband in all areas throughout the country; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [62998/22]

Photo of Ossian SmythOssian Smyth (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 95 and 166 together.

The National Broadband Plan (NBP) state led intervention will be delivered by National Broadband Ireland (NBI) under a contract to roll out a high speed and future proofed broadband network within the intervention area which covers 1.1 million people living and working in over 560,000 premises, including almost 100,000 businesses and farms along with some 679 schools.

There are over 2.47 million premises in the country of which:

- Over 564,00 (22.8%) are within the AMBER area which will be provided with high speed broadband through the State led Intervention;

- Over 1.9 million (77.2%) premises are within the BLUE area which represents those areas where commercial providers are either currently delivering ,or have plans to deliver, high speed broadband services.

I am advised by NBI that, as of 02 December 2022, over 112,200 premises can order or pre-order a high-speed broadband connection across 25 counties, with over 101,700 premises passed across 25 counties and available for immediate connection. Construction is underway across 26 counties demonstrating that the project is reaching scale. To date, the level of connections is increasing on a daily basis and is exceeding projections.

Strategic Connection Points (SCPs) are a key element of the NBP providing high speed broadband in every county in advance of the roll out of the fibre to the home network. As of 02 December 2022, 823 SCP sites (280 Broadband Connection Points, which are publicly accessible sites, and 543 schools) have been installed and the high-speed broadband service will be switched on in these locations through service provider contracts managed by the Department of Rural and Community Development for BCPs and the Department of Education for school SCPs. My Department continues to work with the Department of Education to prioritise schools with no high-speed broadband, within the Intervention Area. Further details are available on the NBI website at nbi.ie/primary-schools-list/.

Eir has said it will roll out its fibre network to some 1.9 million premises. SIRO is currently completing the first phase of its fibre deployment and to date has passed more than 430,000 premises with gigabit services and it has recently announced plans to extend its network to an additional 320,000 premises. Virgin Media is offering 250Mbps as a standard offering with 500Mbps and 1Gbps available to many of their customers across the more than 1 million premises that they cover. Many other network operators and telecom service providers across the State also continue to invest in their networks.

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