Fast speed broadband rolling out in Tipp

Fast speed fibre broadband should be available to all homes and other premises across rural areas of County Tipperary by the end of 2028 at the latest, or possibly even by next year, county councillors were told at their April meeting in Clonmel.

National Broadband Ireland, which won the government contract to rollout fast speed broadband in all areas not targeted by commercial providers, said great progress was being made in Tipperary.

The company’s commercial officer, Joe Lavin, said the firm expected to have rolled out 165,000 kilometres of fast speed broadband cable nationally by the time it expected to end to its contract by 2028.

He said an estimated 20 per cent of the population living in communities where other commercial providers were not operating would benefit from the works. Homeowners seeking to find out if their areas had gone live could find out such details by contacting the company.

Cllr Phyll Bugler expressed disappointment that the company had yet to rollout fast speed broadband in Ballina. She said many people in the town were working from home and desperately needed faster broadband.

She said that, initially, Ballina was to have gone live in January or February last. However, that deadline had now been postponed to October or November. Many people were frustrated by the delay. She was disappointed that there seemed to be no workforce on the ground working on rolling out fast speed broadband in Ballina.

Cllr Marie Murphy said she had constituents who expressed frustration that their neighbours had fast speed broadband but they had not.

Cllr Jim Ryan said some people living on rural laneways had told him that they had been assured they had access to the service. However, they had not been connected. Putting up poles to carry cables on such laneways was essential so these people could avail of the service.

In reply to Cllr Bugler and Cllr Pamela Quirke O’ Meara, Mr Lavin said he would ascertain the dates when Ballina and Silvermines were expected to go live and come back to them with those details.

He said that in cases on laneways where some houses had fast broadband and others did not, it could be a situation were siblings had falling out and one had not allowed access to put up poles to provide a service in a house that did not have it.

In other cases it involved new- build houses where the company experienced delays in obtaining access to eircodes in order to provide the high speed service.

The aim, said Mr Lavin, was to connect four out of every five homes to the faster broadband within a period of ten days from the system going live in areas.

He added that the majority of areas in the contract under which the company was operating would have fast speed broadband by the end of 2026.