Pádraig Rice (Cork South-Central, Social Democrats)
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35. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment if he will respond to matters raised in correspondence (details supplied); if the area may be reconsidered to be included in the State intervention area; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [22495/25]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail)
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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 Programme for Government – Securing Ireland’s Future published in January 2025 sets a number of targets which include the completion of the installation of high-speed fibre broadband to 1.1 million people, including homes, farms, and businesses nationwide, by 2026.

The mapping consultation between fixed line operators and the Department was concluded in 2019.

As part of this mapping consultation the three large, fixed line operators (Open Eir, Virgin Media and Siro) were asked to submit their current High-Speed Broadband (HSBB) coverage maps and potential future maps for HSBB. At the time HSBB was defined as a fixed line technology that could deliver 30Mbps or greater download speed and 6Mbps or greater upload speed.

Resulting from the analysis of this data, the NBI network is deployed to premises in the Intervention Area where HSBB was not going to be delivered by commercial operators.

The Cornmarket Centre and its surrounding area is in the BLUE area on the broadband map which is available on my Department's website www.gov.ie/en/publication/5634d-national-broadband-plan-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 my Department has no statutory authority to intervene in that regard.

As per records available online at www.openeir.ie/fibre/broadband-checker the Cornmarket Centre has been included in Open Eir’s Full Fibre deployment programme which provides a full fibre Gigabit connection. However the build process has not yet commenced.

My Department does not have sight of information that provides an estimated timeline of when commercial operators will provide a full fibre Gigabit connection to the area, other than what’s on the Open Eir messaging (ie some point between now and 2026, when the programme is due to conclude).

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 the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications (DECC) webform at and the Department will escalate with the commercial operator to investigate this matter further.