MINISTER FOR Communications Eamon Ryan is to publish a discussion document on the roll-out of broadband.
Mr Ryan said that a group of international experts was considering a critique of his department's draft policy paper on the Government's optimum role in facilitating the roll-out of high-speed broadband networks.
"After the views of the International Advisory Forum are reflected in the paper, I will publish it for public consultation."
Mr Ryan said that Ireland's growth in broadband penetration had continued to improve during 2007.
"Broadband is available to more than 85 per cent of the population through a combination of DSL, fixed-wireless, cable, fibre-optic and mobile technologies.
"This increasingly competitive market is driving down the cost of broadband."
He said there were 793,000 broadband subscribers at the end of the third quarter of last year in Ireland, representing a significant increase of 81 per cent on the previous 12 months. Recent statistics from the OECD showed that Ireland had the strongest per capita subscriber growth in the OECD.
That meant that Ireland was catching up with other regions despite the relatively late launch of affordable and competitive broadband services in Ireland earlier this decade.
The Minister was responding to a Fine Gael Private Members' motion calling for wider access to broadband.
Party communications spokesman Simon Coveney said the centrepiece of his party's plan related to ducting, a type of pipe that housed fibre-optic cable and represented the largest part of the cost of installing high-speed connection throughout the State.
Mr Coveney called for the introduction of new regulations requiring ducting to be installed in all new buildings. Ducting should be installed in road developments where appropriate to ensure backbone infrastructure was constantly upgraded in a cost-effective manner. Most importantly, he said, steps should be taken to ensure the roll-out of ducting in areas where it could subsidise the private sector's installation of fibre-optic cable.
Labour spokeswoman Liz McManus said the fact that the House was debating broadband provision was in itself a sorry indicator of a sorry Government record.
"We pride ourselves in having a successful and advanced economy and yet at the same time the official record is one of a failure to manage the roll-out of broadband."
