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A GROUP REPRESENTING a number of telecommunications companies has warned the government that it would make a complaint to the European Commission if there were any changes to the National Broadband Plan (NBP).
In a letter to Minister for Communications Richard Bruton, the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators (ALTO), stated it had concerns about the “latest intervention” from Eir.
Eir’s CEO told an Oireachtas committee that it could deliver the NBP for less than €1 billion. The Department of Communications and Eir have exchanged correspondence about the claim.
However, Eir CEO Carolyn Lennon has since stated that she was “surprised” that evidence given before committee was seen by the government as an offer.
The group said Eir’s claim was an “attempt to reopen the public procurement process having previously withdrawn”.
ALTO’s membership includes from BT Ireland, Sky Ireland, Colt Telecom, Magnet Networks, Siro, 3 Ireland, ESB Telecoms, Verizon and Vodafone.
National Broadband Ireland, the company that has been selected to roll out broadband to rural Ireland, as well as Eir, are not members of the group.
The telecoms group said in the letter that the “behaviour of a dominant player such as Eir, tacitly interfering in a social policy measure that is pro-consumer and pro-competition and recognises the need to protect the State (and taxpayers’) investment could have untold reputational and distortionary market impacts if the Government decides to either pause or scrap the NBP intervention as a consequence”.
The letter goes on to state that ALTO will consider whether it is appropriate to
bring such a matter to the attention of the European Commission for further investigation.
The group urged the government not to give it any further consideration despite what it said were “acute and clear political pressures”.
It added that it did not believe the latest intervention by Eir is “credible” and questioned the impact of the offer being considered.
“What is to stop any company making similar ovations, all the while based on entirely hypothetical models?” states the letter.
ALTO said it is “extremely concerned” that if the government was to further delay
the process, that the NBP intervention “will not only stall permanently but runs the risk
that significant damage will be done to Irish telecommunications investment community observing that a process could be derailed by such a late, arbitrary, non-compliant and unsubstantiated offer from an external stakeholder whose commercial interests are probably best served by such an outcome”.
It also warned that its members may turn to litigation should the procurement process be re-opened on the back of Eir’s claim.
ALTO said its members believe “it would be a travesty for rural Ireland if Eir’s late intervention were to disrupt its advancement”.
Reacting to the letter, a spokesperson for Eir told The Irish Independent that “we’re not interfering, we were asked a question by the Oireachtas Committee. We’re a little surprised that Alto is against that type of transparency”.
TheJournal.ie has contacted Eir for comment.
why are we seemingly incapable in ireland of managing any kind of major project for taxpayers – watching this handbag fighting from competing telco companies and the disgrace of every syllable from a tendered who withdrew from the process is beyond a joke. We pay generous secure pensionable positions for civil service and government positions and yet there isn’t a single national project that doesn’t decend into farce ? Hospitals , Transport , Communications -you name it and there’s billions wasted and farcial lengthy processes dragged out – clearly we badly need a complete reform of how we admin this country and make the various departments accountable and fit fir purpose – they are clearly NEITHER at the moment.
@Dave Hammond: this is directly caused by a lack of accountability starting at the top.
In order to deliver projects and services without constant mess-ups we need.
1) If there is a f-up the responsible minister gets sacked or
2) if it is not the ministers fault the most senior responsible person in the relevant department gets sacked/penalised, depending on severity of the error
3) there can be no hiding behind reports or “systemic issues” excuses. The responsible person or their superior, who is ultimately responsible, pay the price for poor performance.
If the above is put in place there is no new laws necessary just a government willing to take responsibility, it will filter down very quickly to all levels of civil service.
@Dave Hammond: This is not limited to Ireland. Read about Berlin Airport.
@Stephen Coveney: it just seems to happen a lot more often in Ireland…..no accountability from anyone in civil service or government for cost overruns
@Dave Hammond: Instead of transparent and constructive engagement on a resolution, we get the threat of law suits, which is the Standard Operating Procedure of who else but DOB, who has seemingly already allocated the 2B++ profit on ‘future’ pro austerity and anti-people projects. It begs the question of who is actually running this corrupt little $-Hole, DOB or Leo or maybe it makes no difference.
Shower of wasters (of tax payers money).
If it can be done for less, do it for less. Reopen the crooked tender process, & get real about it. 3billon is obscene if it can be done for 1.
@Ann Experiment: they can’t, and never could (sticking to the terms) do it for 1. They want to stymie the process while they continue to commercialise the peripheral areas of the nbp, ensuring they can extract as much revenue from their investment plans. The result of this would be the nbp winners needing a subsidy on top of intervention.
@Renton Burke: the contract went to who fg wanted it to go to, thats why the tender process wont be reopened
As long as governments are beholding to a certain person no government contracts will ever be above board or without question.
@Dave Doyle: if it’s tax payers money it’s several sh#ts less given
“we can do it for less than a billion”.
“Sound, lets look at your thought process.”
“Eh, what makes you think we’re interested?”
#Face Palm
@Connor Saváge:
Let’s not make the government look innocent here:
“We are committed to providing facilities that encourage building a strong work force outside of Dublin, Cork and Galway”
“Logically you’ve got broadband covered on such a small island, right? I mean, its 2019 and the country was awash in cash.”
#tumbleweed
@Connor Saváge: Anything that saves the Taxpayers billions should be looked at!
Maybe ALTO members are going to get a lot of contract work out of the company that stayed in the bidding for the job.
@Barry Buckley: the company that stayed in are a shower of overpaid cowboys
Bend over Governmant a private company is threatening you..
Eir is untrustworthy. I commission them to install fibre broadband to my premises, after installing fibreoptic broadband I discovered the fibreoptic only went as far as the local telephone exchange, that could be 3 or more kilometres away, and from the exchange to my premises would be the old fashioned way of a copper telephone line that would be the final connection.
@James Moore: the connection can only be max 2km for fttc so it’s definitely not 3km plus.
@James Moore: Works fine for me and I’ve everything with them. I find them trustworthy. But with, I dunno, a few 100000 customers they will get maybe 5% wrong? You’re unlucky more than them being untrustworthy methinks.
@Paul Furey: but this is the point. This 3m deal is for fiber to the house. That is not needed. If they bring fiber to within 2 km of any house the existing wiring can be used. Why 3m to bring it to the house. Does every farm and home need 300 mb broadband. 95 % of houses would suffice with 50mb. My father in Mayo has EIR TV unlimited BB. He gets 70mb on the wireless network in the home so more hardwired. This is on regular untwisted single pair copper from the exchange. The fiber to every home idea is where the wool is been pulled over people’s eyes. It will never happen and we will have fiber to the exchange or the fiber repeater in a village and then copper to the home whilst paying 3m for fiber to the home. A big big con that most consumers won’t even know about.
@John fitzpatrick:
70Mb/s on wireless. doubt it.
plus its 3bn that you have got wrong 3 times. to be honest most of your comment is made up
@Stephen Coveney: 70mb over wireless is more than achievable.
Digiweb have been offering 100mb wireless for years and Irish broadband before that. Maybe you’re getting confused with satellite
Right, here’s a novel approach. Survey the homes in the intervention area (I am one of these). Ask how likely you are to avail of the service and what speed would suffice, type of use of the internet you use or will use mostly. When that is done you have a starting point. P2p wireless would be sufficient for most homes for streaming, gaming etc. I know line of sight is required and before anyone says 5g will sort it, it won’t not by a long shot.
@Relly12345: but it will never be goid enough. Currently we are on a wirless service, max available is 15GB for €40 per month, with a 200GB cap per month. We never get more than 9GB… To give you an idea if what that is, the son downloaded a new xbix game, it was 39GB, it took 11 hours….. The sooner Eir get us connected too fibre the better. Its 2019 ffs and this goverment are completely useless with a rollout of any sort.
@Mark: it can be. A friend of mine has eir fibre a one point on his land,an old cottage. His main house is approx 300-400 meters away. I set up a P2P wireless connection using ubiquiti gear and he gets 250mb plus in his main house. So I don’t think that’s bad
@Mark:
“Its 2019 ffs”
and? no other country has decided to agree to this. stop moaning
I love this article… I can do it for a third of the price…not after we sue the govt to stop you you cant
The whole thing is a farce. Wireless technology is the way to go but the company’s out there offering such technologies didn’t get a look in at the tender stage. Putting in and maintaining infrastructure in the ground is costly.
@Andy mc Laughlin: Wireless is not the way to go, its a useless service because it depens on the amount connected to the line of sight…. You will never get anywhere close to whats promised
@Andy mc Laughlin: wireless isn’t a guaranteed service, unlike copper or fibre the slightest bit of bad weather and we’ll see how reliable your wireless is.
@Mark McDermott: Locally in Co. Sligo, had wireless line of sight with West Connect for several years now. Always fast, very rarely down, and when down never more than an hour or two. I never had that reliability with Eir.
@Mark: I have what’s called a ‘biscuit’ device i plug into my laptop. It sets up a wifi signal allover the house. Good enough for 4-5 computers and 10 phones. It’s very hot here, and there could be bad storms on the way. But i have a good 3G connection, there’s 3 phones working off it and mine and her’s laptops.
@Mark:
you will never get whats promised, clearly stated in terms and conditions. its theoretical bandwidth. Wireless is the way to go and its nothing to do with actual line of sight but rather what is in between and the frequency being used
ALTO won’t invest in a network. They want it built by someone and made available to them for eff all.
Why should tax-payers in urban areas who already pay exorbitant monthly broadband fees to private companies be made pay a second time for people in rural areas?
@Graham Wilson: turning that around, why should rural Ireland people pay for Luas and other urban services while we may pay a fortune for taxis if car breaks down etc.?
@WoodlandBard: Not the same thing, we already pay for our own broadband, you’re not being asked to pay for your taxis and ours.
@Graham Wilson: The same tax payers in rural areas pay extortionate monthly rates for terrible broadband, why should this be? How exactly would you be paying a second time? That’s like saying, a new road is being built to Wexford, its already at my area so why should I pay to have it built to its destination. Silly argument.
If they can do it with guarantees of no further cost and within a fixed time frame for less than 1 billion then they should be considered. To hell with the other extortionists whining about a clearly suspect and inept tendering process.
The original tender was crafted in such a way it excluded all normal telcos in this country and left the contract to one company, the one who currently said it would cost 3+ billion to do it. Eir have pointed out that the restrictions in the contract were mental and no telco could be able to abide by them, but if they made a few small changes to the requirements they could do the contract for a third of the price. The reality is any telco if they removed these silly restriction could do it then, but the government wants to keep these in place to eliminate all other bidders except the one single one they pre-selected to begin with. The one who is charging the most, is not a telco, and is run by someone FG know well.
Tell the IMF with them to go to Hell…
Jason Byrne the comedian in his routine on the UK circuit had a fine line about Irish People’s willingness and enthusiasm to have a go at any job, despite not being remotely qualified!
He used brain surgery as an example “Jayzus I could do that”
That’s the spirit needed to make Ireland even greater!
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