Duncan Smith (Dublin Fingal, Labour)
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97.To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the provision that has been made in the National Broadband Plan for issues known as direct buried ducting which can preclude premises or an entire estate from being connected to fibre broadband; and if he would direct the providers to investigate the issues affecting [details supplied]. [25396/24]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The National Broadband Plan (NBP) is the government's initiative to deliver high speed broadband services to all premises in Ireland.

The premises and estate in question are in the BLUE area on the broadband map. The BLUE area represents those areas where commercial providers are either currently delivering or have plans to deliver high-speed broadband services. The Department defines high-speed broadband as a connection with minimum speeds of 30Mbps download and 6Mbps upload.

The activities of commercial operators delivering high-speed broadband within BLUE areas are not planned or funded by the State and the Department has no statutory authority to intervene in that regard. There may be a choice of operators offering this service in any given area. Further information in this regard is available at www.comreg.ie/compare/#/services.

If a person lives in the BLUE area and after contacting their Retail Service Provider are told they cannot get access to greater than 30Mbps, they should raise a query via my Departments webform at secure.dccae.gov.ie/forms/NBP-Customer-Service.aspx and the department will escalate with the commercial operator to investigate this matter further.

As per records made available to this department the premises in question is currently capable of getting over 40Mbps from open eir’s local HSBB cabinet CAB1_037. Virgin Media can also provide fibre level speeds to this estate.

My Department is aware through engagement with various stakeholders, including commercial operators and ComReg, of the possibility that it may not be viable for commercial operators to reach all premises in urban areas to deliver on EU and National Targets. These are areas currently not within the scope of the National Broadband Plan.

The Department is addressing issues such as these through the Mobile Phone and Broadband Task Force (the Taskforce).

The Taskforce comprises State actors and industry representatives and is tasked with identifying and overcoming barriers to improved connectivity. The Taskforce was originally established in 2016 to identify immediate solutions to mobile phone and broadband coverage deficits, and to investigate how better services could be provided to consumers prior to full build and rollout of the network planned under the National Broadband Plan State intervention (NBP).