I welcome the Minister to the House. I am delighted to see him here and hope he is as concerned about wind energy in this country as I am when I look at some of the statistics that I have and some of the issues in County Limerick in particular. There are at least three wind farms being proposed for County Limerick and in that context there are two issues I want to raise, relating to curtailment costs and wind energy maps.

In 2013, a circular was sent to the county councils that said not to amend or adjust their wind energy maps until new guidelines were released. The Minister knows as well as I do that we are still waiting for those new guidelines. Limerick City and County Council amended one of its maps for an area in County Limerick called Creeves. The local authority changed it from orange to green. I assume that was to suit a developer that wanted to put a wind farm there. It was not being proposed as a preferred area for wind energy. The argument is that, if the council can change it from orange to green, why can it not change it from green to orange or green to red, considering the number of objections that are submitted against each of the proposed wind farms.

The wind farms that are being proposed are themselves in breach of the 2006 regulations, where the turbines have to be seven turbine lengths apart from one another. I am not even talking about their distance from houses and schools. They are not, though. From what we can gather, they are 3.5 turbines lengths apart. When you have them that close together and there is a downwind, they become noisier. That is the reason they should be seven turbines apart from one another.

When it comes to curtailment, we have a strategy in this country to achieve 9 GW of wind energy generated onshore. I think we are at 4.5 GW or 5 GW at the moment. I do not know; I am only guessing. We curtail a certain amount of energy because our grid cannot hold it. I know the Minister will reply with all of the different reasons our grid cannot, the constraints and everything else. We know the grid is not up to standard. I want to see the grid getting up to standard - we all do - but it is like putting the cart before the horse, with us putting all of these wind turbines and wind farms in before the grid can actually take that wind energy.

The Minister knows what I will say, in that the cost of energy curtailment is put back on the consumer. The wind farm developers get paid regardless of whether that turbine is turning. They get paid their curtailment cost. For years, we have been promised that wind energy will lower our energy costs, but it is not doing that and we are paying a large amount. In 2024, there was a bill of £1 billion for curtailment in Scotland. If we keep going the way we are going by putting in more wind energy and turbines even when our grid cannot hold it and we have to keep curtailing, we could see ourselves hitting €1 billion by 2030.

I have spoken about this to experts who have worked on wind energy. They are engineers who have designed wind turbines and worked in the United States on wind energy. They are all for wind energy but not the way it is being done here and not in a way where we cannot hold this energy, whereby we end up having to curtail and put a cost back on everyone. The renewable electricity support scheme, RESS, 3 came in and relieved any of these countries from having the cost of curtailment put back on them. I have been told that the Minister could address that. I am not an expert in wind energy. When the wind turbine is turned off, the company is still being paid for wind energy regardless of whether it is producing any. If the Minister could give me a couple of answers, that would be great.

I thank Senator Collins for her questions. I am delighted to be here in the Seanad today to answer them. I will preface my remarks by saying I will not comment on individual applications that have been submitted and I know the Senator will appreciate why. I will speak generally.

As an island nation, we have some of the best wind resources in the world and we are uniquely positioned to lead Europe's renewable electricity future. In Ireland, we are the best in Europe at integrating renewables into our grid. Senator Collins mentioned the grid and I will touch on that in a moment because the grid is critical. Actually, I will touch on it now. The grid investment programme we have published, which is basically the capital plan between 2026 and 2030, will see up to €18.9 billion investment in our grid. That is nearly four times the cost of price review 5, PR5, the investment programme that concluded at the end of December and cost between €4.5 billion and €5 billion.

The investment is needed. It will improve resilience. It will allow us bring more renewables into our grid. Importantly, it will ensure that we can use the energy we are generating and will reduce curtailment and, therefore, curtailment costs.

Storage is a big part of that, as in how we can store renewable energy and then disperse it at the appropriate time, particularly to deal with peaks in energy demand. Only last week, coincidentally, I was in County Offaly where two major battery storage facilities opened. In PR 6, we will see not only generation in grid; a lot of it is battery and it is storage, and that is critical. A lot of our developers are now developing out those storage facilities in conjunction with the renewable energy facilities, be that wind or solar. We have about 1.3 GW of storage now and we are expanding very quickly on that. That will help on curtailment. Next week, and the Senator's question is very timely, I would expect Ireland to reach a milestone of 8 GW of renewable energy capacity in this country, which is really significant. Obviously, offshore is where we are going as well, and I expect the first offshore schemes on the east coast to be in construction by the end of the decade. The original plan was to have them electrified, although they will not be because of planning. However, some of them will be coming out of planning very soon. Ireland was the only EU state late last year that had a successful offshore wind auction off the south east coast, which was the Tonn Nua or New Wave auction. What I am really saying to the Senator is that our energy future and electrification will be very much driven by renewables. If I look at solar for argument's sake, seven or eight years ago, one tenth at 1% was all we were generating. To put it a better way, maybe ten or 15 years ago, we had 2 MW of solar, that is it. We have 2 GW now, and that does not include the 1 GW of rooftop solar we have that is not connected to the grid.

The Senator rightly raised the point in relation to affordability. We still have challenges here in Ireland and across Europe with regard to energy affordability. When we look at the purchasing power index, we are kind of mid-table, but we need to do better than that. That is why people need to see the clean green sustainable energy we are creating actually make savings in their pockets. Only today, coincidentally, Wind Energy Ireland had an independent report published through Baringa, which estimated that onshore wind drove about €1.4 billion worth of savings last year, and solar about €165 million. That is actually looking at what we are deploying versus if we were to continue to import gas and fossil and use it that way.

I will come back to the wind energy guidelines in a supplementary comment because I recognise the community benefits. We need to ensure there is a community benefit for people, and they need to be planned properly. I will come back in on my supplementary comment on that, however.

I thank the Minister for his response. It is great to see that he is not just reading off a script and that he is engaging with this. It is fantastic to see that there are projects going ahead that are going to increase our capacity for holding this energy. As I said, however, it is putting the cart before the horse. Is there any way the Minister would put a pause on these proposals to put more wind energy in until the grid is at a stage where it can hold that energy and where curtailment costs are not going to be added to people's bills?

The second issue is the position or places where they are put. In Limerick county, 70% of the land mass is preferred for wind energy. That is madness. We could be covered in wind turbines when, at the same time, we are trying to look at the offshore energy. Shannon Foynes Port is a fantastic facility for offshore. It is the deepest port in Europe, and it has unbelievable facilities. I have been there. I have seen its plans a couple of times. We could definitely look into getting the designated maritime area plans, DMAPs, a little bit more quickly so that we could move from the south east around to the west coast and look at maybe getting it offshore and stop congesting our rural communities with wind turbines.

Any planning application that goes in is a matter for the planning authority. The Senator knows this; I am stating the obvious. The local authorities decide themselves and then if it is appealed to the board or An Coimisiún Pleanála, they will make the decision. There is no question of us pausing for the development of renewable energy sources. If we have learned anything, and we have learned a lot, particularly since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, it is that the overdependence on fossil fuels from third countries is not something we can sustain. About 25% of our gas resources come from the Corrib, and that is diminishing. The rest is imported through two pipelines from Scotland. It would be problematic if anything were to happen to either of those pipelines. That is the reason I am bringing forward the floating gas reserve, so that we will have a gas reserve to use as a back-up.

On the designated maritime area plan, DMAP, side of things, I have been in Shannon Foynes at least twice. It is really impressive. There are great plans there and it is a great port. We are accelerating and have brought forward a national DMAP. There is the east coast and the ORESS 1 auctions. We had Tonn Nua and will have Lí Bán early next year, which is another auction.

I want to build a pipeline of offshore renewable projects. We have already commenced and we got about €165 million of funding in the capital development plan for the national DMAP. Why is that important? It is so we can look at all our territorial waters, map them on a sequential basis and build up that pipeline for the development sector to deliver them. Our real focus is on renewables, reducing our dependence on fossil, reducing our emissions and delivering clean, green affordable energy for our people. There are communities, and I respect this as well, who have issues on the ground. There needs to be better engagement on the ground. We are looking at reworking the community benefit fund. I can respond in more detail in writing.

I thank the Minister, Deputy McEntee, for coming in.

The Minister is welcome to the House. I think this is the first time I have addressed her since she was returned at the last election. I congratulate her on taking the foreign affairs, trade and defence portfolios.

Today marks the fourth anniversary of Putin's illegal invasion of Ukraine and it is over 12 years since Russia invaded the Crimean Peninsula. I am here to speak of the work of the UCD Ukraine trauma project, an Irish initiative that is saving lives every day in Ukraine, often within minutes of injury and sometimes within seconds. The key point is time is of the essence when it comes to injuries.

Since the beginning of Russia's full-scale illegal invasion of Ukraine, one of the greatest challenges facing Ukrainian medics has been the management of severe bleeding and major trauma. This is the leading cause of preventable death in this conflict. The techniques and equipment required for advanced haemorrhage control require access to the very early administration of tranexamic acid, TXA. Sadly, TXA remains very limited or unavailable in many parts of Ukraine. Where it is administered quickly, it can reduce mortality by 10% to 25%. This is not a statistic. It is a human being alive because the right intervention happened at the right moment.

In response to this need, volunteer advance paramedics and doctors from the Irish health service, led by Professor Chris Fitzpatrick and Professor Gerard Bury, both sitting in the Gallery today, have travelled to the Ukraine since November 2022, sharing their expertise through intensive two-day training courses. These front-line clinicians finish a shift in an Irish emergency department or an ambulance service and then give their own time at personal risk to support Ukrainian colleagues working under bombardment.

To date across nine training missions, the UCD Ukraine trauma project has trained more than 650 pre-hospital emergency responders, doctors, dentists, nurses, vets, academic instructors and paramedics from every front-line agency in Ukraine. Alongside this training, they have delivered over 1,700 advanced trauma kits, each containing tools needed to stop catastrophic bleeding and administer TXA in the field. The work does not replace Ukrainian expertise; it reinforces and enhances it. The feedback received is clear and humbling. The skills they teach are being used frequently and the equipment provided is saving lives. Demand for places on their courses far exceeds capacity to deliver them.

These wonderful people plan two missions in 2026, delivering six two-day courses to an additional 300 providers. That will mean 300 additional medics fighting to save the lives of brave Ukrainian forces. The projected cost of this work is €558,000 and they have submitted a detailed proposal to the Department of foreign affairs.

They assure me that they remain deeply grateful to the Minister's Department, the Irish public, the HSE and the Red Cross, whose generosity, channelled through the UCD foundation, has made every mission to date possible.

In December 2025, volunteers were honoured beyond measure when President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the First Lady, Olena Zelenska, recognised the project during their visit to Dublin. Dr. Lyudmyla Zakharchenko, Professor Chris Fitzpatrick and Professor Gerard Bury accepted awards on behalf of more than 50 volunteers at that meeting. In his public remarks, President Zelenskyy asked them to continue and, if possible, to increase their efforts. They intend to honour that request. Their programme is evidenced-based and continually evolving. They are now developing new methodologies for delivering TXA that it is believed will significantly broaden its availability and impact across Ukraine. The roll-out of this innovation will form a central part of their 2026 mission.

Ireland has always stood with those who suffer the consequences of war, displacement and injustice. The UCD Ukraine trauma project is a uniquely Irish contribution. It is practical, compassionate and rooted in our national tradition of medical excellence and humanitarian solidarity. The Minister's support is invaluable to them. I ask her to ring-fence the €558,000 from all humanitarian aid that she intends to provide to Ukraine so this project can go ahead. I look forward to keeping her updated on the progress and many hopes for the successful delivery of the key elements in 2026.

One thing I should say is that it is not just soldiers now. Civilians are being murdered miles away from the front line. Civilians are suffering trauma.

I thank Senator Craughwell. It was the quickest six minutes ever. I call the Minister, Deputy McEntee.

I thank Senator Craughwell for raising this topic. I also acknowledge Professor Fitzpatrick and Professor Bury in the Gallery

As the Senator said, he is raising this topic on a particularly sombre day. I think we are all finding it hard to imagine it is four years since the first day of Russia's brutal, illegal and barbaric war, one it has been waging and is increasing in scale and volume. Since February 2022, in addition to military attacks, Russia has targeted Ukrainian energy, transport facilities, hospitals and schools, all with the intention of trying to break the spirit of the Ukrainian people and, indeed, trying to break the spirit of the EU as a whole and European citizens.

We have seen hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians killed, along with Russia's own soldiers that it is sending to the slaughter. Millions of people have now been left without heat and power in freezing winter weather, in temperatures of -24°C and -25°C. We can all see that the Ukrainian people and their spirit have not been broken, and neither has our commitment to support them. Only yesterday, I spoke with the Foreign Minister, Mr. Andrii Sybiha. Last week, I had an opportunity to meet and speak with the Defence Minister, Mr. Mykhailo Fedorov. At the Munich Security Conference recently, I met soldiers who were on the front line and who had taken time to come to relay exactly what is happening to them. At every step of the way, I have relayed Ireland's continued and absolute support for Ukraine and reaffirmed that we will support the country for as long as necessary. I know the Irish people also support this. I have also conveyed the need for the EU as a whole to remain absolutely steadfast in our support for Ukraine and the pressure that needs to continue to be placed on Russia.

I acknowledge and welcome the ongoing efforts to end Russia's war of aggression, including the efforts made by the US, the EU and many others to achieve a just and lasting peace for Ukraine. We will do this as an EU member state and through our participation in the coalition of the willing, which the Taoiseach participated in this morning. Russia's response to peace efforts to date has been to continue its missile attacks, to intensify the number of soldiers it is quite literally sending to the slaughter and to attack civilian infrastructure and towns, resulting in casualties and increased suffering. Russia can stop this at any time. It chooses not to; it chooses the path it has taken. This means more and more civilians are suffering.

In bringing this topic to the Seanad today, the Senator has highlighted and given me an opportunity to highlight not just the response from a Government perspective but also, thankfully, the huge amount of work our own citizens are doing. So much of it is unseen and unheard. I am pleased to say this is not the first time I am hearing of this project. I commend the absolutely invaluable work that is being done by Professor Fitzpatrick and Professor Bury and all those involved in the UCD Ukraine trauma project.

The valuable work of training pre-hospital civilian and military first responders is a further manifestation of the solidarity I have spoken about. The project is quite literally saving lives. As Senator Craughwell referenced, President Zelenskyy and the First Lady, Olena Zelenska, honoured the project's success with a Golden Heart award during their visit to Ireland last December. I take this opportunity again to congratulate the project on the work being done, with more than 650 people trained and nine missions. I am sure there will be many more missions to come for as long as they are needed. There have also been 1,700 advanced kits. All of this work is literally saving lives.

At my direction recently, officials at the Departments of education and Foreign Affairs and Trade have been engaging directly with the UCD Ukraine trauma project to discuss the work planned for 2026. We have been trying to examine how best we can help Ukraine as it continues to experience tremendous levels of need. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates that 10.8 million people will require humanitarian assistance. The work of this project, and the need for it, is absolutely essential.

The most recent updated joint rapid damage and needs assessment estimates that at the end of 2025, the total cost of reconstruction and recovery in Ukraine was almost $588 billion. However we can help, be it through humanitarian assistance, direct funding for critical infrastructure, the funding we have been providing for defence spending or the funding we need to provide for these types of projects, we will continue to provide this support and help.

Senator Craughwell will appreciate, and I know both gentleman in the Gallery will appreciate, that when we are providing this level of assistance, particularly directing it through our office of development, we have to ensure that all projects go through in-depth analysis and that we go through the engagement that is part of the process to make sure the money goes exactly where it is needed. I assure Senator Craughwell that we will engage closely with the UCD Ukraine trauma project along with our partners on its work and make sure we can continue this essential work.

I thank the Minister for a very comprehensive response. I am extremely proud of Ireland and the Irish people for what we have done for Ukraine but the basis of all humanitarian aid has to start with the preservation of human life. Human lives can be saved. We see the statistics are quite stark, with between 10% and 25% mortality catered for. The essence is to get the project up and running again. I implore the Minister to ring-fence €558,000 out of the money allocated to Ukraine for this project because it is delivering real results on the ground. The preservation of life is what it is all about. Now it is no longer just soldiers; through Putin's war crimes it is innocent civilians who are being killed in Kyiv, Donetsk and other parts of Ukraine. If the Minister can do this I would truly appreciate it.

I acknowledge the excellent work being done through the project. It is a perfect example of how quite literally civilians and citizens in Ireland have come together to provide support. We know there is a huge amount happening beyond this as well. There are over 100,000 Ukrainian citizens living in Ireland. They are in our communities, towns and villages. While we might be geographically the furthest from Ukraine and from where the war is happening, for all of us our hearts are very much connected to what is happening on the ground. This is why we see these types of responses and why we see those with such experience who want to give back and provide the support and help. From my perspective as Minister in the Department, where I can provide financial assistance to allow this to continue, it is something I absolutely want to do. I and the Department will continue to engage in with the project in supporting it and helping it to deliver this essential and, as Senator Craughwell said, life-saving support on the ground.

The Minister of State is very welcome to the House this afternoon. Over recent years, I have frequently raised the issue of the retirement age of 70 years old for Bus Éireann drivers. Today, I raise it again, seeking an update. This practice discriminates against people who are capable of providing a valuable service, and a much-needed one at that. Many people, me included, feel it is unfair that drivers are not able to continue to drive a bus after their 70th birthday under Bus Éireann contracts. These people may be perfectly fit, perfectly healthy and be medically assessed and licensed to drive a bus, but they cannot do so because Bus Éireann's one-size-fits-all policy means anybody over 70 years of age is considered unfit to drive a bus.

This is a discriminatory and ageist policy that needs to be addressed and re-examined. A cohort of people are fit and well, have been medically assessed and are fully licenced but, unfortunately, they are prohibited from driving under a Bus Éireann school contract because of their age. There is no problem with a 70-year-old driving a school bus in the UK or in other jurisdictions but it seems to be a problem with us here, as far as Bus Éireann is concerned.

Many of the people doing this work have retired from their full-time occupation and are happy to drive a school bus. It is not overly taxing, in that it is not a 40-hour or 50-hour week process. We are talking about an hour and a half or so in the morning, and the same in the afternoon. It is not 52 weeks of the year. It follows the academic year, so there is a good bit of time off in that regard. Surely the same medical assessment carried out by Bus Éireann for a 69-year-old who is then subsequently deemed fit to drive could be authorised for a 70-year-old or 71-year-old. The ironic part of all of this, as the Minister of State will be well aware, is that the same 70-year-old or 71-year-old can drive those schoolchildren to a football match 150 miles away and take them home, yet they are not allowed to take them to school in the morning and bring them back home again in the evening. It does not make sense and is not logical.

Every September, we have issues here with school transport in that there is a shortage of drivers. Here, we have a cohort of people who are willing, able and fully licensed to do a good job on behalf of the State and to provide a valuable service, but they are prohibited from doing so. I have been asking that common sense be adopted in Bus Éireann's thinking on this matter. It seems to be possible in other jurisdictions but, unfortunately, that has fallen on deaf ears.

I understand that during the Minister of State's time, he has been instrumental in reviewing the situation as regards large coaches, and I understand the medical evidence coming back from that - perhaps he might elaborate on this - was to the effect that for large vehicles, there could be a higher risk. However, the same argument applies for Bus Éireann-operated services and private-operated services. Surely for smaller vehicles, there would be less risk. If we allowed those people to do that, they would provide an invaluable service where we are short on drivers.

Deputy Moynihan is a common-sense Minister of State with a get-up-and-do attitude, so I hope this common sense will be extended to Bus Éireann in order that 70-year-olds who are fully fit, fully licensed and want to do the job can be allowed to do that valuable service.

I thank the Minister of State for coming in. Before he responds, I wish to acknowledge and welcome two groups of visitors from Wexford and Laois with the Ceann Comhairle, Verona Murphy, and Deputy William Aird. They are very welcome. Normally, school-going visitors do not get any homework, but they look as though their schooldays are over, so they will just have to suck it up.

I thank Senator Gallagher for raising the issue. I will go through a few brief points first.

The school transport scheme is a hugely significant operation run by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department of Education and Youth. The retirement age for school bus drivers has been set by Bus Éireann at 70 years of age, which also applies to all Bus Éireann road passenger services. The policy and criteria also apply to drivers nominated by private operators who operate services as part of the school transport scheme, provided they hold the licence and satisfy the annual medical examination until they retire at 70 years of age.

A commitment was given under the new programme for Government to "Carry out an independent assessment on the feasibility of removing the exclusion of drivers aged over 70 from the School Transport Scheme". Both I and the Department of education have continued to engage with the Department of Transport and Bus Éireann on this matter. The Road Safety Authority, under the remit of the Department of Transport, committed to reviewing the upper age limit of drivers as it relates to larger vehicles and school buses. This review has been completed. To fully consider all vehicles, Bus Éireann has secured its own independent analysis of the issue in the context of small public service vehicles contracted to deliver school transport services under the school transport scheme. As it is a Bus Éireann policy in the first instance, this analysis is being considered by Bus Éireann, and I and the Department of education await the decision.

I fully understand the points the Senator has made about the over-70s. It has long been discussed and the Senator has raised it quite a number of times in this House. On my appointment to the Department last year, it was an issue we wanted to get clarity on. Our issue was the August 2024 report that was there. We set up a departmental task force with the Departments of education and Transport, Bus Éireann and Education and Training Boards Ireland. The aim of the task force is to work together to identify the factors. The school transport scheme is a huge operation on behalf of the State every year, and the Senator will know from his county that we have serious challenges getting drivers and buses for particular routes. While we see the issue with the over-70s and the transport issue we are facing, I assure the Senator that the Department of education and I, together with the Department of Transport and Bus Éireann, are working very much together to try to find a solution to this. It is with the board of Bus Éireann and there is ongoing engagement with it. It is a fundamental decision Bus Éireann has to take. The points are always well made about how changing the rules would allow us to have a greater cohort of people able to drive school buses. The points the Senator made about how these people have retired from their main jobs are extremely valuable. I have reflected on all that very carefully and it is important that we bring clarity to this as soon as possible for smaller vehicles that are providing services to the school transport system. I will update the House when a decision is made on it. I might refer to another point or two in my closing statement.

I thank the Minister of State very much for his response. I welcome the fact the review is complete and hope we are getting near to the endgame with this. We cannot lose sight of the common-sense approach to all matters, and there is a very common-sense approach to this issue. Nobody is talking about being reckless here. Individuals of 70 years of age and older will have to pass the necessary medicals, have the necessary licence in place and all that. Surely to God we can find a role for those people who are fit, active and want to play a vital role for society by taking children to school and back in the mornings and evenings. This has been going on for a while - not during the Minister of State's reign, I hasten to add, and I know he is trying to progress it - but when will we have a decision, which I hope will be a positive one, on this issue?

There are a number of issues we are considering as well.

The issue is in cases where someone driving a school bus is 69 years of age but turns 70 during the school year. We must look carefully as to whether it is possible to extend those drivers until they are in their 70th year or turn 71. For those individuals who are driving from September to June but turn 70 in October or February, for example, we must look at the possibility of extending that in the first instance.

A lot of work has been carried out with regard to the smaller vehicles. It is safe to say that I meet the school transport people on a weekly basis to ensure we are up to speed on where the issues are in relation to school transport. We will be opening the portal shortly again for the September 2026 school year.

This is always an issue. The Senator has raised it a number of times in the House and with me as well. I am acutely aware this would open possibilities for us. I hope we will have a decision sooner rather than later because it is important that we bring clarity in this regard. The challenges we have are the previous reports, but we have a cross-departmental look at it. I will endeavour to report back to the Senator when a decision is made.

I thank the Minister of State, Deputy McConalogue, for coming in.

I thank the Acting Chairperson. I hope I am allowed the same additional time everyone else has received.

I will not be as generous any more.

There is an issue raising itself across Ireland at the moment. While on the surface it might seem quite minor, in reality, it points to a much deeper failure in how we manage our national infrastructure. Following last year’s storms, communities saw widespread damage to telephone lines. Poles were strained, wires were brought down and networks were disrupted. To their credit, service providers acted quickly. In many cases, lines were restored, connectivity returned and phones and broadband worked again.

That is only half the story, however. Across the countryside today, the physical remains of the damage are still there. Wires have been left hanging across roads and farm entrances or they have dropped into ditches, been caught in hedgerows or left trailing alongside boundaries. Critically, this is not just old copper infrastructure; it includes existing telephone wires. It is not simply a legacy issue but a current operational failure. This is not just storm damage but, rather, the consequences of a system where restoring service is prioritised but restoring the environment is not.

We have to be honest about what has changed. Telecommunication infrastructure in this country is no longer fully publicly owned. It operates through a privatised model. While that model brings efficiency, it also brings incentives. Once the customer has service restored, the job is effectively considered done. There is no immediate commercial driver to remove redundant copper lines, properly secure or re-route poles and wires, clear debris from roadsides and fields or address infrastructure that is no longer active or properly installed but still physically present. What happens is that we fix what is visible on the bill and ignore what is visible on the ground. This is not just untidy and inconvenient; it is often unsafe. Low-hanging cables pose a risk to farmers trying to access land, machinery moving through gateways and pedestrians and road users. With hedge-cutting season and seasonal work approaching, these risks will only increase. People will avoid working near these lines, and rightly so because no one should have to guess whether a cable is live, inactive or improperly installed.

There is, however, a second issue here that is even more concerning, which is that the integrity of the network itself is being put at risk. Where cables are left dragging against trees, loosely installed or poorly tensioned or are exposed to constant movement and weathering, they do not remain harmless. They degrade. Fibre cables in particular are sensitive to bending, strain and repeated stress and some are left sagging or rubbing against branches. We are not just looking at poor workmanship, we are looking at future faults being built into the network. All of this is happening in the context of a broader transition. Ireland is moving from copper to fibre, and that is the right direction, but what we are seeing is a transition that has only been completed halfway. The new network has been rolled out and the old one is being abandoned. In the process, every part of the new one is not being properly secured. This leads to a simple but unavoidable conclusion: we have created a system where there is responsibility for delivering a service but no clear responsibility for the physical condition of the infrastructure delivering it. This does not require a technological solution but it requires a regulatory one. We need a clear obligation to remove redundant infrastructure. We need full clean-up as part of storm recovery, not partial repair. We need proactive inspections, not reliance on individual complaints, and accountability for the physical state of the network and not just whether it works. Infrastructure is not just about connectivity; it is about how the connectivity exists in the real world, in our landscape, our roads and our communities. If we continue as we are we will keep restoring service quickly but we will also continue leaving behind a trail of neglect, one that is unsafe, unsightly and ultimately self-defeating.

I thank Senator Scahill for raising this matter today. Communications infrastructure across the country has seen significant investment of over €5 billion over the last eight years. These investments over that time by both the State and commercial operators ensure that Ireland has access to the latest digital infrastructure, whether that is 5G mobile connectivity or gigabit fibre networks. These investments also ensure that our networks are more resilient than ever before.

Notwithstanding that, Storm Éowyn had an unprecedented impact on telecommunications networks last winter, as the Senator has very clearly outlined in his contribution here. The impact of the sustained power loss during the storm and the delays to repair of overhead lines in some areas afterwards had significant effects on citizens and particularly in rural areas of the north and west. The extensive damage to the electricity network and the consequent loss of mains power had the most significant impact on the telecommunications networks during that storm. Our modern telecoms networks are heavily reliant on electricity for their operation and while services can be maintained for several hours on battery power, the batteries are not designed to cater for power outages of many days. I understand that ESB Networks is undertaking its own resilience programme to mitigate the risk of power outages, which should see significant benefits for the telecoms services.

Nonetheless, the extent of service outages experienced in the aftermath of Storm Éowyn last January has placed renewed focus on how resilient our sector is. The programme for Government reaffirmed our commitment to investing in the State's telecommunications networks. The programme sets a target for the completion of the high-speed fibre network to provide broadband access to 1.1 million people, including homes, farms and businesses nationwide by the end of this year. To date, the total amount invested by the State in the national broadband programme since 2020, when the national broadband plan network roll-out commenced, is €1.152 billion. As part of the network roll-out, a comprehensive programme has been undertaken to assess and, where necessary, replace poles used to carry the overhead fibre network. This programme has seen over 1.1 million poles stress tested to date and replaced where necessary.

In addition to the State's significant investment in gigabit fibre networks, the commercial operators have also been investing heavily in their networks over the last number of years. Mobile and fixed-network operators have invested in improving their networks and targeting resilience measures such as increased use of underground ducting, installing additional on-site backup batteries, and making 1,700 power generators available. Since January 2025, when Storm Éowyn exposed the inability of the networks to withstand sustained power outages, operators have focused new additional investments on improving power resilience at key sites. This has involved putting in larger batteries and making more sites ready for mobile power generators in the event of longer power outages.

Beyond investments, my Department continues to engage with industry through the telecommunications response and resilience group, which was established last September to improve the physical and power resilience of networks, co-ordinate and communicate more effectively during emergencies and prioritise key infrastructure to provide minimum levels of connectivity during emergencies.

One of the first key outputs form this group has been the identification of a list of key mobile sites that are being prioritised for resilience and restoration measures. In the event of a future storm, once these sites are restored or kept on air, a basic level of connectivity is maintained across the country. This idea was first suggested in a meeting that was convened by the Minister with industry in the aftermath of Storm Éowyn last year and I am glad that it is progressing.

The group met again just last week to discuss progress and to set out its plans for this year. I understand it will focus on matters related to mitigating the risk of trees or branches falling and damaging the infrastructure and other fixed network priorities.

Our recent work to improve resilience is set against a wider effort to improve resilience and preparedness more generally across many aspects of society. The legislative framework for the resilience of critical infrastructure across all sectors is undergoing significant change this year. This will have a positive impact on telecommunication networks.

The second EU networks and information systems directive and the EU critical entities resilience directive are two directives that are in the process of being transposed and implemented by the Departments of justice and Defence, respectively. Together, they will regulate minimum standards for the resilience, risk and incident management of entities in the cyber and physical space under the supervision of national competent authorities. Taken together, these measures will set out a process for operators to systematically identify other potential vulnerabilities to severe weather events in their critical infrastructures that will allow for the targeting of their future investments in resilience.

I thank the Minister of State for his response. I welcome the investment in this infrastructure and I know what we are trying to do. However, there is the reality on the ground. As I drive around the Roscommon-Galway constituency, I see areas in Fairymount where 500 m of cable are hanging down at the side of the road. I drive to Lisalway, heading out to Castleplunkett, and see the same thing. I have been up in County Donegal and when one drives to places such as Carndonagh, one is not oblivious to these cables hanging down as the side of the road. Somebody needs to be held responsible. Just because the service is being delivered to individuals at the moment, it does not mean it is right to leave these cables hanging along the roadsides. Something needs to be done. We need inspections on the ground. We need it tensioned up.

There is also a safety issue as we come into the verge cutting season. I am worried about that. It might put the service in jeopardy.

Just last week, I spoke to a lady in her early 80s. She said she has reported the issue to the phone provider numerous times but is still not getting a service. She is still paying for her service because she presumes the provider will look after her once the service is restored. Many of these private companies will not address the issue and will not look at tidying up because the standing orders are still coming in. That is where we have to take responsibility and be the ones to press those providers and ensure they are doing the work.

Deputy Cathal Crowe was in the viewing Gallery a moment ago. He will be experiencing the same thing in Clare. It is happening all across rural Ireland. It is a matter we must look at.

I thank the Senator. I will certainly ask my officials to come back to him on the point he has raised. We must ensure that where wires are in an unsafe position, the companies responsible engage, take action and ensure they are made safe. There is significant work happening at the moment to road test and stress-test our networks. We are stress-testing poles. I outlined earlier that 1.1 million poles have been stress tested and many have been replaced where they were found to be unsuitable. It is crucial for that work to continue. In instances where wires are hanging low and in a dangerous position, it is crucial that they are addressed immediately.

I will also relate to my officials instances where people are being charged. I will ask them to engage further with the Senator on that matter. I thank him for raising the issue.