IrelandOffline question the commitment of the Minister to Irish broadband consumers

IrelandOffline question the commitment of the Minister to Irish broadband consumers

IrelandOffline recently did some research on the Irish governments website http://www.broadband.gov.ie and particularly on the supplier list.(1)

We ask Minister Ryan to explain the grossly inaccurate and out of date website his department runs. This shows how low Broadband Provision to Irish People is on the Minister’s priority list. This shoddy and grossly out of date website is beyond a joke in 2010.

75% of the listed suppliers no longer exist. Many went out of business before the end of 2008. About 1/4 of the suppliers actually exist, many by another name or via takeover. 87% of the listed packages are no longer on offer. Who gets 512k Broadband nowadays? Only about 1/10th of packages are valid and available today.

Nor are any Bundle deals shown on the site despite the fact that most new product launches in the past 2 years have been bundles.
One listed supplier, Mediasat, went out of business in March 2008 and nobody in Minister Ryan’s department even noticed, much less the Minister himself. Minister Ryan’s staff can hardly pretend not to know of Mediasat given that many of them were present when his predecessor, Minister Ahern, launched the service in 2004.(2)

This site is the much trumpeted “one stop” shop for people throughout the country in their search for broadband suppliers. It was launched as a “Comparison” site by Minister Dempsey.

Minister Ryan was referring enquiries from T.D.’s about non existent Broadband services on the ground to this shoddy site of his only two days ago, As he glibly told Frank Feighan T.D. on the 20th of January 2010 (3)

“Details of the availability of broadband services in County Roscommon, are available at www.broadband.gov.ie. I would add that the information contained in this website is provided by service providers.”

Eamonn Wallace , IrelandOffline Chairperson said:

“It is somehow apt that the “smart” and “green” policies espoused by Minister Ryan are represented by a website that directly compares nothing to absolutely nothing.
These companies and their packages generally no longer exist just like broadband policy in his own department no longer exists. His www.broadband.gov.ie website has not been touched since 2007.”
IrelandOffline is today offering to take this site over, FREE OF CHARGE, and to bring it completely up to date by the end of February 2010 .

We feel that it is both “smart” and “green” to let the experts deal with the matter and at absolutely no cost to the taxpayer. We guarantee we will have it halfway up to date by the end of January when we delete all the dead companies and their packages.

We await the Ministers assent if he truly wants Irish people to get TIMELY and above all ACCURATE information from his department.”

Notes and References

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(1) http://www.broadband.gov.ie/List+all++Services/
(2) http://www.enn.ie/story/show/9396634
(3) http://www.kildarestreet.com/wrans/?id=2010-01-20.1493.0&s=www.broadband.gov.ie#g1495.0.r