Immediate intervention to improve broadband needed in some rural areas

The Green Party has said that broadband is a key issue for remote working in rural areas.

Spokesperson for Communications, Climate Action and the Environment, Brian Leddin said: “For those who are able to carry out their job remotely, from a public health perspective we need to make sure that broadband exists for everyone. In the short term we need to continue to add to a database of locations where connection speed is not up to scratch”.

Noting that the minimum connection speed for the Zoom videoconferencing app is 1.2 Mb/s and that for Microsoft Teams is 1.5 Mb/s, the Limerick City TD said:  “Broadband speeds are commonly advertised in terms of download speed, but for video conferencing, upload speed is equally as important. We need to identify where people are trying to work with a connection speed of less than 2 Mb/s upload and see if there is any immediate intervention we can do, ahead of a longer-term intervention of rural broadband.”