Joint Committee on Communications, Marine and Natural Resources 2002- 2007

The Joint Committee considers it imperative to first of all define an understanding of the term broadband. During the consultation process the ICT sub-Committee heard various definitions of the term, some expressed in absolute terms and some expressed in terms of the ability to use various applications.

The Joint Committee has concluded, for the Irish market, that speeds of anything less than 512kbs is not broadband but is in fact in a class known as ‘mid-band'. This would include such services as ISDN connections and 124 and 256kbs DSL connections. In this respect the Joint Committee's definition of broadband differs from that in use by other groups and significantly differs from the definition currently to be found in Section 8 of the Finance Bill 2004. The Joint Committee believes that all connections at speeds of less than 124kbs, currently the majority in the Irish economy, have to be regarded as narrowband connections.

Having said this, the ‘broadband bar' is being raised constantly and in absolute terms the definition of broadband is constantly changing, but the indisputable fact is that this is upwards, not downwards. As an example, Japan has a 26Mps services available to consumers. Therefore, broadband can be taken to have a very different meaning in Japan to Ireland. As a consequence the Joint Committee believes it will be important to review and redefine the accepted definition on a regular basis.

As such the Joint Committee believes that the Government should adhere to a target for the widespread availability of 5Mps services to residential users by 2006 and that this should then increase to a level of approximately 10Mps by 2008. If the potential of broadband is to be realised however, larger bandwidths will have to be made available in the short term to bodies such as schools, libraries and health care facilities. As such the Joint Committee believes that Ireland should be targeting bandwidths of 4Mps upwards The Government should also set a national target for the level of use of broadband that is both realistic and competitive in comparison with other countries. Whilst starting from behind, the Joint Committee believes that with the current level of development in the market and the continuing involvement of the Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources Ireland should be targeting a residential broadband penetration rate of approximately 8% by the end of 2004.

This would be in line with the EU average and would be a first step on the road to realising the vision set out by the Government in the Information Society Action Plan report titled “New Connections” of Ireland being in the top decile of OECD countries by 2005. With regard to schools and other facilities such as libraries Ireland should be targeting 100% broadband penetration in such institutions by mid 2005.

In so far as it exists for Ireland, the current national broadband strategy is to be found in the New Connections plan and in the Broadband Action Plan announced by the Minister in December 2003. Whilst New Connections provides a compelling vision of a broadband environment and the Action Plan announces a series of new broadband related measures, both fall short of providing a clear and actionable strategy, which can be endorsed, adopted and bought into by the private and public sector in partnership.

As a country Ireland cannot afford to fall behind in this area nor can Ireland afford a free spending approach where the Government attempts to finance the rollout of broadband As befits its importance, the Joint Committee believes it is now time for a co-operative planning approach to be adopted in relation to the provision of a national high-speed broadband network. The Joint Committee is strongly of the opinion that such a coordinated approach will pay significant dividends in the short term and greater dividends in the long term. Such planning should ensure that broadband policy is properly integrated into other national strategies.

Any such plan will need to draw a careful distinction between an ambitious vision for a national broadband network and a workable reality. It will need to include short-term actions and goals but balance these with medium and long-term policies. It will need to account for the needs of the urban majority whilst also acknowledging the equally valid requirements of the rural minority.

The Joint Committee believes that achieving widespread broadband availability will require the use of a variety of broadband technologies and as such any plan should not overly rely on the development of one particular technology. The plan should map out a detailed role for the public sector and an equally detailed plan for the private sector. Finally, and critically in addition to addressing backhaul and backbone broadband requirements it must clearly articulate a strategy for the development of a national first mile broadband network.

The Joint Committee sees the preparation of such a plan as an immediate priority. At present users are operating in an environment where there is a lack of clarity around how Ireland will achieve the goals of the national broadband vision and there is a lack of shared understanding between the public and the private sectors as to their appropriate roles in making that vision a reality.

The development of a national high-speed broadband network and the creation of the services to be offered across this network will never fall neatly into any one Government Department. Even so, Government needs to speak and act with one voice on this issue and this can be done only if all Government Departments agree to work in pursuit of an agreed broadband network strategy and this strategy, in its entirety, is overseen and co-ordinated by one person. As the Advisory Committee on Telecommunications noted in 1998 “ a coherent approach to regulatory policy and implementation should be established between all relevant Government Departments”.

The Joint Committee advocates, given the varying and time-consuming portfolio that the Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources already manages, that a new Minister of State position should be created within that Department. This Minister of State would be charged with ensuring that a national high-speed broadband network is fully implemented in a timely fashion.

The Joint Committee advocates that the Minster of State would have responsibility for building on the established strategy, ensuring the rollout takes place according to the plan and critically promoting and facilitating the usage of broadband once the plan is in place. This should be coupled with responsibility for the development and rollout of eGovernment services. As the Joint Committee will point out later, ensuring broadband resources are fully utilised once they have been rolled out will be one of the key challenges going forward.

Such a Minister of State would take on some of the responsibilities currently held by Ministers in the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment and the Department of An Taoiseach. The Joint Committee believes that the special Minister of State would be best appointed to the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources given that Department's key role with regard to the development of the telecommunications industry.

The rate of change in broadband, as has been pointed out, is astonishing and governments around the world have struggled to keep up to date on all the many developments in the area. The Government will be helped in its task if it has access to the expertise that exists in industry and consumer groups. This could happen via consultation with a broadband strategy advisory group, which could advise on developments in the broadband area.

The purpose of such a group should not be to produce a new broadband strategy for Government, that leadership function must remain the domain of Government, but rather such a group should advise on what is feasible, practical and acceptable in terms of broadband network roll-out and utilisation.

The need for just such a group was the rationale behind the creation of the Telecoms Strategy Group set up in February 2003. While the Joint Committee welcomes the introduction of such a group it is felt that, as presently constituted, it has a limited membership. The Joint Committee believes such a group needs to have a wider base of members including direct representation from Eircom, the incumbent.

The Joint Committee also recommends that consumer representatives and representatives from the software and other IT industries should be included in such a group. As the organisations either using or selling the applications and the tools that make use of broadband, these constituencies also have a different and important perspective on the rollout of broadband.

The involvement of the Government's Information Society Commission in advising the Minister on broadband issues would also appear to have been very successful but the Joint Committee is concerned that the number of bodies examining and advising the Government in this area may not be ideal and is recommending that an amalgamation of the work of the different groups into one advisory body should take place.

An example of the multiplicity of voices that can be heard on this issue was the fact that the industry group IBEC made three separate submissions to the ICT sub-Committee, one from their ICT Group, one from its Telecommunications and Internet Federation (TIF) Group and one from its Telecoms Users Group (TUG) and on several issues each group took different positions.

As noted before once the regulation of the telecommunications market was handed over to the ODTR the Irish Government, like many governments elsewhere, began to reduce its involvement as an active participant in the telecommunications arena. As the state of the broadband market in Ireland now testifies this is not a market that can be left to develop on its own – especially if regional communities and the requirements of balanced development are to be secured.

The Joint Committee believes that the Government needs to fully accept responsibility for rolling out the new national broadband strategy once developed. This means that the strategy will have to stipulate timeframes, allocate responsibilities and the Government will have to assume responsibility for ensuring that these timeframes are adhered to.

Just as central government has a role so too does local and regional government and more needs to be done to ensure that both local and regional government are working towards a common goal and are working in tandem with, and not at odds, with central government. This will be particularly important in the context of the greater number of civil servants that are now likely to be working from rural areas.

The consultation process the sub-Committee engaged in included a presentation from the South West Regional Authority which is doing a superlative job in bringing broadband to the South West area. In particular the Joint Committee recognises the innovative and entrepreneurial approaches that have been adopted by authorities such as the South West Regional Authority and the Dublin City Development Board in endeavouring to make broadband widely available within their area of influence, whether via satellite or via alternative means.

To ensure that broadband gets built into the planning process across local government the Joint Committee recommends that plans for broadband infrastructure be incorporated into all regional, county and city development plans. Most immediately this will ensure that plans are actually being made to rollout broadband on a local basis and secondly it will ensure that both the public and private sector interests will have visibility of these plans and will be able to input into these plans before they are implemented.

The recent announcement from Government on the decentralisation of a number of Departments to regional locations will have an obvious impact, as this move is likely to generate a large increase in broadband demand in non-urban areas. As such it has the potential to provide the justification for the rollout of broadband to these areas. This presents Government with an ideal opportunity to begin to aggregate Government demand for broadband in a tactical fashion to stimulate and support the wider market.

The majority of the costs associated with providing broadband are capital costs. Whilst these costs are low when the infrastructure (or merely the ducting to carry the infrastructure) is laid during the building stage, costs spiral upwards when attempts are made to retro-fit facilities for broadband infrastructure. As such there is a compelling argument to be made that all new developments (both major structural works and residential developments) should be obliged to include provision for broadband.

The costs associated with laying new fibre can be very high particularly where the ‘cut and cover' method of digging the hole, laying the fibre and covering it over again is used. Not only is this costly, but as residents of Dublin, Cork and a number of other cities will attest to, it is hugely disruptive and time consuming. To some degree there will always be a need to conduct such works but effective planning and integration of broadband development into other developments should reduce this dependence.

The Joint Committee recommends that all new major structural projects be subject to the requirement that such developments assist in the establishment of a national broadband network and as previously indicated that broadband development be built into regional, county and city development plans. This practice has already developed to a degree within certain parts of the country but it needs to become uniform. In effect this would mean that where new roads were being built (and where not duplicating existing infrastructure) ducting for telecoms cabling should be built along side the roads – as was the case with the development of Cork's ring-road.

Equally when it comes to the development of new industrial estates, grant aid and other forms of assistance should be conditional on basic broadband infrastructure of sufficient quality being made available on an open basis to all providers.

In the case of our national building stock, new planning/building regulations should be considered which would mandate a minimum standard of basic infrastructure, which would be a condition of new developments. The infrastructure referred to would not be expensive cabling or servers etc. but rather the basic infrastructure that would allow such cabling etc. to be laid without excessive cost at a later date where demand warrants it. The detail of this would need to be worked out with input from industry, but the principle of ‘future proofing' our national building stock is sound and will appeal to developers looking to differentiate their developments.

The Joint Committee finally recommend that the Joint Committee on Environment and Local Government look in detail at this proposal.