Advertisement

We need your help now

Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.

You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.

If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.

Shutterstock/PowerUp

7 ways the government says it will fix broadband access in Ireland

The government’s plan to speed up and deliver broadband services has been repeatedly delayed.

TODAY A GOVERNMENT put forward its recommendations for how issues around access to broadband and mobile phones will be solved.

Communications Minister Denis Naughten and Arts Minister Heather Humphreys brought a report compiled by a broadband taskforce before Cabinet for consideration.

The report contains 40 actions aimed at accelerating the delivery of telecoms infrastructure, ahead of the rollout of the National Broadband Plan which will bring high speed broadband to all premises throughout the country.

Here are the key actions included in the report:

  • Mobile blackspots will be found and suggestions will be made to attempt to fix them (with one possibility being the assignment of spectrum in the 700MHz band).
  • A new network coverage map will be published and phones performance in certain areas will be tested to help people to make their choices on what internet provider and what package to buy
  • A broadband officer will be appointed in each local authority to help telecommunications companies build out infrastructure.
  • A new 95km ducting is being built along the M7 / M8 motorway, which will complete the ducting on this important Cork-Dublin route.

shutterstock_326155928 Shutterstock / asharkyu Shutterstock / asharkyu / asharkyu

Some more technical aspects which will improve broadband services include:

  • A licensing regime for repeaters in 2017 will allow householders and businesses to install high quality signal repeaters on their buildings, to boost in-house signals.
  • From the first quarter of 2017, all local authorities will apply waivers in respect of development contributions for telecoms infrastructure developments.
  • Legislation will be introduced to allow current planning exemptions for 3G antenna to extend to 4G antenna.

An annual forum convened to discuss wider issues impacting the rollout of telecoms infrastructure across Ireland, and a group will monitor the implementation of the report.

Delays

shutterstock_312949043 (1) Shutterstock / Kerdkanno Shutterstock / Kerdkanno / Kerdkanno

Ireland has frequently scored poorly in comparison to other EU countries when it comes to the percentage of households that have access to broadband.

The National Broadband Plan was first announced in 2012 with very little progress made until last year, when then-minister for communications Alex White said he expected to sign contracts with the winning bidder or bidders by mid-2016.

However, the procurement process is still ongoing and a winning bidder has yet to be appointed.

Minister Denis Naughten said that he’s ”critically aware of the frustrations being felt across Ireland in terms of poor connectivity” and that the Broadband Plan would be delivered in “the shortest time possible”.

Already, mobile operators are completing upgrades of their 3G and 4G networks; there was an €8 million allocation in Budget 2017 for the 700MHz spectrum band; telecoms operators are continuing to invest in the rollout of high speed broadband across Ireland.

Fianna Fáil Communications spokesperson Timmy Dooley criticised the timeframe for the implementation of the report, saying “there is no need to undergo another mapping exercise to see where there are mobile broadband blackspots. The mobile phone operators know exactly where coverage is poor”.

What people in many communities will be asking when they read this report is: when will my house get access to decent, high speed broadband and mobile coverage?
Unfortunately, the answer is the same as it was before this report was published: 2023 at the earliest for fixed high speed broadband in the home.

According to the Department of Communications, 1.4 million households currently have access to high speed broadband.

Read: These are the areas in Ireland with the slowest and fastest broadband speeds

Read: Here’s what to do if your broadband speed is wrecking your head

Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone...
A mix of advertising and supporting contributions helps keep paywalls away from valuable information like this article. Over 5,000 readers like you have already stepped up and support us with a monthly payment or a once-off donation.

Close
53 Comments
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Alan Bolger
    Favourite Alan Bolger
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 7:12 AM

    Shocking appeal by the PSNI

    156
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Neil Neart
    Favourite Neil Neart
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 9:28 AM

    @Alan Bolger: The PSNI brought the war to ordinary decent republicans giving them no option but to fight back. Its time to get to the bottom of this and move on.

    95
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute GrumpyAulFella
    Favourite GrumpyAulFella
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 1:48 PM

    @Neil Neart: I presume you mean RUC and not PSNI.

    18
    See 6 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute James Beattie
    Favourite James Beattie
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 2:20 PM

    @GrumpyAulFella: well back Eoghan. I asked you a question the other day and you disappeared. As a few of the other posters pointed out, you always disappear when the questions don’t suit your narrative.

    13
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute GrumpyAulFella
    Favourite GrumpyAulFella
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 2:28 PM

    @James Beattie: are you addressing that to me or some guy called Eoghan? I presume that you’re responding to the wrong post.

    3
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute James Beattie
    Favourite James Beattie
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 3:04 PM

    @GrumpyAulFella: it’s for you Eoghan, you obviously think the same when you replied

    9
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Mona Murphy
    Favourite Mona Murphy
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 4:42 PM

    @GrumpyAulFella: same force just different name aka b specials

    10
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute GrumpyAulFella
    Favourite GrumpyAulFella
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 5:42 PM

    @James Beattie: ah ok Mary.

    3
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute GrumpyAulFella
    Favourite GrumpyAulFella
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 6:46 PM

    @Mona Murphy: i think there are more than 3 times more Catholics in the PSNI than were members of the RUC. 32% versus less than 10%, so more balanced but still some way off being entirely balanced from a community perspective.

    2
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Peter McGlynn
    Favourite Peter McGlynn
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 7:32 AM

    Into the 3rd decade of this and worse happening In Guantanamo Bay. Two Obama administrations and now one Biden administration. some there for 17 years without charge.
    The southern government guilt of collusion in allowing rendition flights from Shannon.

    59
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Garry Brady
    Favourite Garry Brady
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 8:29 AM

    @Peter McGlynn: fail to see what relevance the USA and Ireland have to the torture of British citizens by PSNI .

    78
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute frank_66
    Favourite frank_66
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 11:25 AM

    @Garry Brady: no psni in 1971 it was ruc and it was Irishmen who were tortured

    52
    See 3 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute joebloggs
    Favourite joebloggs
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 11:29 AM

    @Peter McGlynn: what is the Southern Government you refrr to. Is it the Government of Ireland ? Refer to it properly please

    27
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Brian Lyons
    Favourite Brian Lyons
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 12:06 PM

    @Peter McGlynn: think you left out a fella in between….

    15
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Angela McCarthy
    Favourite Angela McCarthy
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 3:20 PM

    @joebloggs: You mean the Government of Ireland which is not under foreign rule? as opposed to the part of Ireland which is and was when the torture of those Irishmen happened.

    19
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Patrick Brompton
    Favourite Patrick Brompton
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 11:08 AM

    It was the RUC that arrested the men in 1971, not the PSNI. It was British Army soldiers who tortured them in Castlereagh and other barracks. There is a very good book called ‘Cruel Brittania’ which gives the history of the use of ‘enhanced interrogation’ techniques by the members of the Intelligence Corps. Don’t forget that the European Court of Human Rights decided initially that these techniques did not amount to torture.

    38
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Barbara Coleman
    Favourite Barbara Coleman
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 2:07 PM

    @Patrick Brompton: Yes and we were part of EU while all this torture of Irish citizens was going on. That ruling also gave the go ahead to others to do the same the world over.

    16
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Paul Murphy
    Favourite Paul Murphy
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 2:32 PM

    @Patrick Brompton: all very true and while not condoning the events these,are standard procedures used by many military organisations to extract information from captive and there fore expected by combatants. Further highlighting that army were not a suitable force to be engaged in what was a police role. All most all of this type of activity and other crimes attributed to the army was because they weren’t trained to deal with civilians. The use of military forces in support of the civil power is now widely accepted but should never be used in a policing role

    4
    See 5 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Angela McCarthy
    Favourite Angela McCarthy
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 3:24 PM

    @Barbara Coleman: and so was Brittania an EU member at the time.

    Do you post Brexit that the European Court would more emphatically come down on the UK over its illegal dirty war if it was happening today?

    7
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Angela McCarthy
    Favourite Angela McCarthy
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 3:46 PM

    @Paul Murphy: Sorry Paul, but that is a load of horse manure. Britain had been pulling – forced out of colonies all over the globe since the end of WW2, so dont tell us this was a new situation for them.

    General Kitson had written a book/manual on how to deal with revolutionary movements in the occupied zones, how to turn communities and different political movements against one and other, and how its own forces could arrest, torture and beat confessions out of people, before their fates were decided.

    What happened to the Hooded men was but one piece of Kitsons box of trix. The North in those early days was just one big testing ground in the British militaries experiments in counter Insurgency warfare, the far most important being the use and control of Loyalist Paramilitaries, including the Shankill Butchers, as the ultimate instrument in terror against the nationalist community. As we can see today, this was monster from Britains Pandora Box that cant be entirely switched off and put back in the box.

    The RUC, just like its former self the RIC which was formed in 1825, was always a paramilitary police, which were armed like an army, stayed in Police Barracks, as opposed to police stations. The sectarian one-party state in the north survived its first 50 years by such a force.

    For all the methods of torture, murder, black propaganda which were part of Kitsons bag of trix, they never managed to defeat the IRA or the community from which they took their support. In fact, the IRA came out of the war at the end, a lot, lot stronger than when they went into it in 1969.

    21
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Matt Rogers
    Favourite Matt Rogers
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 4:37 PM

    @Patrick Brompton:
    And ever since governments all over the world have used that ECHR decision to reject the alleged torture of suspects.

    4
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Matt Rogers
    Favourite Matt Rogers
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 4:43 PM

    @Angela McCarthy:
    The IRA goal was a United Ireland but almost 30 years have passed since their 1993 cease fire !?.

    2
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Paul Murphy
    Favourite Paul Murphy
    Report
    Jun 14th 2021, 9:22 PM

    @Angela McCarthy: I take it you forget that the British Army were deployed to Northern Ireland to protect the Catholics from the Protestants and had never been deployed on what was considered to be home turf by the,UK government. The methods mentioned had been used before Kitsons book and are even in use to this day as the recent gameshow type event based on ARW depicts. It has been proven to this day that the UK government was neither forced out or pulling out of Northern Ireland and had the British Army been given free reign as in Malaya the IRA and others would have ceased to exist.

    1
Submit a report
Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
Thank you for the feedback
Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.
JournalTv
News in 60 seconds