Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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In December 2022, my Department published Ireland's Digital Connectivity Strategy which supports the ambition outlined in the National Digital Strategy and sets out a number of ambitious targets, including that:

• all Irish households and businesses will be covered by a Gigabit network no later than 2028
• all populated areas will be covered by 5G no later than 2030, and
• digital connectivity will be delivered to all schools and broadband connection points by 2023

These targets will be achieved through commercial operators investing in their networks, complemented by the State’s National Broadband Plan intervention. When taken together, all premises in the State will have access to high-speed broadband in every part of the country no matter how remote.

The National Broadband Plan intervention contract provides for the roll out of a high speed and future-proofed broadband network to primarily rural areas. The intervention area covers over 1.1 million people living and working in over 560,000 premises, including almost 100,000 businesses and farms along with some 679 schools.

My officials have requested an update from NBI as to when your constituent, whose premises has recently been added into the intervention area, will be in a position to place an order for fibre broadband to his premises. However, I can confirm that all neighbouring premises along this road are ready to connect which means all the necessary fibre infrastructure has been completed by NBI and the connection should not take too long. NBI will now send a crew to the premises to survey the works required to bring the fibre into the home from the road. As it appears no infrastructure has previously existed at this premises, NBI may need to erect new poles or install new ducting and this may require a private wayleave and possibly a licence from the Local Authority for any works on the public road. Once NBI provides further details on this my officials will relay a target date for connection to both your constituent and your office.

There is also a Broadband Connection Point at Inch Community Centre within 1.2km of this premises where free access to high speed broadband is also available. NBI advise that as of 27^thOctober 2023, 191,146 premises are passed across 26 counties and available for immediate connection. 58,332 premises are already connected to the NBP high-speed broadband network.

Additionally, as of 31^stOctober 23,886 premises in County Cork have now been passed by NBI with a high-speed fibre broadband network and available for immediate connection, with 7,441 premises now connected.

Further details are available on specific areas within County Cork and can be monitored via nbi.ie/reps.A county update can be selected to provide the overall number of premises in the Intervention Area, the overall NBP investment in the county, the number of premises passed and connected to date and the status of each of the Deployment Areas with the anticipated date for connection over the lifetime of the project. NBI has a dedicated email address, reps@nbi.ie, which can be used by Oireachtas members for specific queries.

Commercial operators’ fibre rollouts are progressing at pace. Open eir have already passed over 125,000 homes and businesses in Cork with gigabit services, with plans to pass a further c.97,000 homes and businesses over the next 2 – 3 years, bringing their total fibre-based investment in the county to over €89m. Other commercial operators are also continuing to increase their network footprint right across country, with SIRO recently passing over 520,000 premises for full fibre and is on track to reach 700,000 premises by 2026. While Virgin Media have passed over 69,000 premises, and have announced plans to bring 2Gbps services to 345,000 premises, through an upgrade and expansion of their own network, and to bring gigabit broadband upgrades to 1 million premises.

Recent ComReg data shows that Quarter 2, 2023 saw a 7.4% increase in fibre broadband subscriptions compared to the first 3 months of the year, and a 33.7% increase when compared to Quarter 2 of 2022. This demonstrates that take-up of fibre connectivity for homes and businesses is increasing massively as it is deployed to areas where it had previously been unavailable. The same ComReg data also indicates that c.40% of homes and business throughout the State now have access to gigabit services through either fibre (576,856) or cable (359,669) infrastructure.