No community in Mayo left behind under National Broadband Plan – Dillon
Fine Gael TD heralds the "biggest infrastructural project since rural electrification being delivered on time and in budget."
37,000 homes, farms and businesses in Mayo can now avail of high-speed broadband as a result of Fine Gael’s determination to leave no community behind, Minister of State, Alan Dillon TD said.
In Mayo, €145m has been invested to connect 37,000 premises, with over 15,200 able to order and over 4,000 connected.
Achill Island now has 2,500 premises with access, with 387 connections already made.
Minister Dillon was speaking as National Broadband Ireland (NBI), the company rolling out the National Broadband Plan (NBP) completed works to enable over 2,500 new connections on Achill Island.
This means residents of Ireland’s largest island will now have the same access to reliable broadband as any urban area in the country.
Minister Dillon said: “In Mayo the benefits of broadband have been immense. A growing number of businesses can now produce, distribute and sell their goods and services more competitively.
Farmers have benefitted through smart farming, which allows remote monitoring of livestock, lower operational costs and reduced impact on the environment.
‘The availability of high-speed broadband services has also allowed rural schools to benefit through facilitating innovative educational tools, granting access to specialist teaching resources and enabling equal engagement by distance learning.”
Minister for Communications, Patrick O’Donovan, T.D said: “The National Broadband Plan is one of the largest State infrastructure projects since rural electrification, and ensures that no community, home or business is left behind from a connectivity point of view. This means that delivering broadband infrastructure to the residents of Achill Island is a natural extension of this mandate.”
Minister Dillon added: “Crucially, broadband has also enabled remote working, which allows people to have more flexible working arrangements and to reduce their carbon footprint and urban sprawl by cutting down on commutes to large cities.
‘The National Broadband Plan was first instigated by Fine Gael and the then Minister Richard Bruton in 2019.
Fine Gael faced down tough opposition from all sides to this plan and were accused of political opportunism. Every other party was against it, wanted to prevent it or abandon it.
‘Had Fine Gael not pressed ahead with our plan, the nationwide rollout of broadband would still be a pipe dream.
Thankfully we are now on track to deliver a massive infrastructural project on time and in budget, with scope to grow for generations to come,” Minister Dillon concluded.