All TDs to get Broadband - Wait, they didn't have it already?

damien

http://www.siliconrepublic.com/news/news.nv?storyid=single4888

he Houses of the Oireachtas have put out a tender seeking more than 200 broadband connections for the homes and constituency offices of TDs in order to facilitate remote access.
Tenders are being invited to upgrade existing connections to broadband. At present access is provided by ISDN circuits and Lucent ISDN routers, which will become redundant.

There are almost 200 separate locations, spread across all areas of the country, that will require broadband. This number of locations may increase in the future, the tender document states.

According to the tender document, the Houses of the Oireachtas are seeking a broadband provider that will provide the service as part of a two-year contract.

If the contract rollout succeeds, it could act as the kind of trigger that will ensure rural locations currently not being provided with broadband get this initial service.

However, broadband lobby group IrelandOffline expressed surprise that serving TDs do not already have broadband. IrelandOffline committee member Aidan Whyte told siliconrepublic.com: “We were quite surprised to note that not our all of our elected representatives had broadband already and even more surprised that they needed help to get broadband. I would think though that their difficulty mirrors the difficulty that 45pc of the population are having with broadband unavailable to them.

“Despite numerous reports recommending e-government as one method of promoting broadband we now see that our TDs are not using broadband. This does not help address the dire broadband situation in Ireland. All stakeholders need to pull their weight and work together to promote broadband uptake,” Whyte said.

Wouldn't it be nice if the Government tendered to have everyone else get broadband?

SkepticOne

I'm sure Eircom will sort them out.

Paddy20

I really hope EirCoN fail. They only deserve too lose.

P.

Mr_Man

I live close to our local TD and it'll be interesting to see how long it takes for the satellite dish to appear on their roof

M.

damien

Wouldn't it be interesting to see all those that can't get broadband to write to their TDs complaining that they're going without yet the TDs get it?

Victor

However, broadband lobby group IrelandOffline expressed surprise that serving TDs do not already have broadband.

Surely the sarcasm should be emphasised.

eircomtribunal

damien.m wrote:

Houses of the Oireachtas have put out a tender seeking more than 200 broadband connections for the homes and constituency offices of TDs in order to facilitate remote access.

This should be brought to the attention of the Comptroller and Auditor General. Why should money be wasted on getting broadband to the TDs, when everybody can get broadband, according to no lesser man than the Communications Minister?

NOEL DEMPSEY
Well, there are ways and means of getting broadband in any part of Ireland at this point in time. There are wireless options, WiMax, there’s obviously through the telephone line, there’s satellite offerings as well, so you will get broadband anywhere you like in Ireland.

Another case that should get looked into is the generous telephone allowance of the TD's, that is outdated by now and only encourages them to waste taxpayer money.

P.

SkepticOne

damien.m wrote:

Wouldn't it be interesting to see all those that can't get broadband to write to their TDs complaining that they're going without yet the TDs get it?

But satellite is available everywhere...

It will be interesting to see if the TDs get real broadband while the schools are forced to make do with sat pseudo-broadband.

SkepticOne

eircomtribunal wrote:

This should be brought to the attention of the Comptroller and Auditor General. Why should money be wasted on getting broadband to the TDs, when everybody can get broadband, according to no lesser man than the Communications Minister?

I think it is as much about getting free broadband for TDs as getting broadband where none is available.

Unfortunately the contract will either go to Eircom or some satellite reseller. Some areas may get their exchange upgraded and so it might be a good thing although it might just be Eircom rearranging the order in which they upgrade already scheduled exchanges in many cases. Then they can shift a couple of other people onto pair gains if the TD needs a decent line.

damien

SkepticOne wrote:

Then they can shift a couple of other people onto pair gains if the TD needs a decent line.

Be a nice little experiment to do a dsl line check on all the phone numbers of the TDs to see can they get bb. Time to email the volunteers list.

vector

does the tender give a minmum speed in k?
could that be interpreted as an official minimum to for comreg?

this isint necessarily good news for rural/non-DSL areas, it doesn't mean that those area will be enabled/improved the satellite cop-out, or if money is no object, the leased line, could be used instead