Rural Ireland desperately needs broadband, but we need to see how the costs associated with the plan have escalated so dramatically. The Government today signed off on the plan at a cost of almost €3bn, six times the original estimate. Is this the pre-election hoodwinking of Rural Ireland to garner votes?
This Government is now costing the taxpayer billions of Euros. The cost overrun in the National Broadband Plan is set to be bigger than the one at the National Children’s Hospital.
We cannot continue to treat taxpayers’ money in this way. It is unacceptable, and we must get to the bottom of how this came about.
I am calling on Minister Bruton to appear before the Oireachtas this week to answer questions about the plan.
Opposition spokespeople were previously promised a briefing on the issue but that never materialised.
Rural Ireland desperately needs broadband but the government has made a complete and utter mess of this process and we now need to see if there is value for money in this plan.
It is deeply concerning that there is no commencement date for the roll out of broadband despite the long cabinet meeting and publicity event following the announcement.
There needs to be a focus on delivery from the outside in, to ensure that areas which have suffered due to lack of services such as broadband see the benefits sooner rather than later. There are areas that have lost out on employment opportunities over many years due to poor broadband services. These are the areas that need employment the most. This is why we need to see a detailed breakdown of what areas will be connected and what timeframe we are looking at.
The gap funding model is a flawed model and the Government made a mess of the tendering process leaving us with just one bidder.
The Government plans to use taxpayers money to bankroll this process to the tune of €3bn yet at the end of it all the taxpayer will not own the network.
Government needs to explain why they are now going against the advice of his most senior adviser in his department.
