Nobody will be left behind in drive to tackle the digital divide

Rolling out fast broadband to rural areas is just as important as the electrification of the country nearly a century ago, writes Denis Naughten

BRIAN O’DONOHOE’S opinion piece in this newspaper last Sunday questioned the need to roll out high-speed broadband to rural Ireland that was capable of meeting the needs of users for 25 years and beyond.

I feel compelled to respond as a rural TD and as Communications Minister. I want to reassure people in rural Ireland that high-speed broadband will be delivered to every premises in Ireland under the National Broadband Plan which I am driving. The plan will be one of the single biggest investments in rural Ireland for generations.

The reality is there are provincial parts of this country that are significantly behind where they need to be in terms of modern communications infrastructure.

Across the country, from inner cities to remote rural parishes, there are communities that are partly or sometimes wholly excluded from basic criteria of modern convenience and comfort, in terms of communications, energy efficiency and fuel poverty.

It is exactly because of this that a top social, economic and political priority for me is delivering the National Broadband Plan in the shortest time that is humanly possible. This plan will revolutionise businesses and communities across provincial towns in rural Ireland. As a rural TD I know only too well the frustrations of people living in rural Ireland who cannot access online services — 1.8 million people. This is not acceptable and I am determined to deal with this head on.

Over the last five years, the telecoms industry has invested €3.3bn. This is roughly equivalent to Ireland’s annual public capital programme.

As a result, 1.3 million homes and businesses in Ireland can now access high-speed broadband of at least 30mbps and 4G data services are available to more than 90pc of the population.

The broadband plan will address this deficit. It may even reverse the urban-rural digital divide.

So what is the plan? It will deliver a high-speed broadband network to more than 750,000 premises, covering 100,000km of road network and 96pc of the land area of Ireland.

The current procurement process to build this network stipulates a minimum speed of 30mbps to all premises and an expansion path for a solution that will last for 25 years.

When I look at the scale of this plan, I associate it with rural electrification. It is critical that we make the right intervention. We aim to do this once and do it right.

Every home and business in Ireland will have access to highspeed broadband and be future proofed for advances in technology for decades to come.

Bidders in the procurement process have indicated that they are proposing a predominantly fibre-to-the-home solution for rural Ireland. This is their choice and I welcome this news. It is good news for rural Ireland. So I was surprised to read in Brian O’Donohoe’s article that some believe fibre-to-the-home may not be the optimal solution.

It may be helpful to refer to the rhetoric around the Shannon Scheme in the 1920s. In Michael Shiel’s story of rural electrification The Quiet Revolution: The Electrification of Rural Ireland, he notes that some media at the time “while not actually hostile expressed doubts about the size and timing of the venture”. He quotes one newspaper as saying: “The present needs of Southern Ireland cannot be more than about 40 million units per annum… whereas the scheme provides for 140 million units. The Irish people…with such an excess of power…may all be electrocuted in their beds.” Shiel notes that the figure of 150 million units was reached within 10 years of the signing of the contract for the Shannon Scheme and by 1970 “annual consumption of electricity from rural consumers alone exceeded 1,000 million units”.

The world of telecoms is strikingly similar. Data usage on mobile networks has increased by 500pc in the last five years and fixed-line internet traffic is set to double every two years.

Commercial operators worldwide will make their investments based on the financial returns they can achieve and the technologies they choose reflect this reality. While this has driven very significant investment in parts of Ireland, that investment has not materialised in several other areas.

For Government, the returns are not all about short to medium-term financial profit. They are about improving and supporting communities, businesses, our economy and people. Left to the market alone, parts of rural Ireland would never get high-speed broadband. The National Broadband Plan will address the gap between what commercial operators will provide and what we as a society aspire to and demand.

Last week’s article suggested difficulties with planning for a predominantly fibre-to-the-home network. All technologies bring planning and roll-out challenges, including both fixed line and wireless.

In Ireland we are fortunate to have two national networks that are capable of delivering fixed-line services to homes and businesses in every corner of the country. In rural Ireland, much of this can be achieved through the use of existing overhead poles. Most countries have one national fixed-line telecoms operator, but Ireland also has the ability to use its electricity infrastructure, thanks to legislation introduced by the Oireachtas in 2014.

Through the work of the Mobile Phone and Broadband Taskforce, which I established with Minister Heather Humphreys almost as soon as I took office, we are working with local authorities to improve planning. The appointment of a broadband officer as a single point of contact for telecoms operators in each local authority will be key to overcoming obstacles quickly.

I am determined to deliver as Communications Minister a National Broadband Plan that will provide people in rural and urban Ireland with the quality connectivity they deserve, regardless of where they live. No premises will be left behind and the service will endure for generations to come.

‘The broadband plan will address the gap between what commercial operators will provide and what we as a society aspire to’