ComReg lied lied lied to the Oireachtas when they testified in front of them a few months ago. They told them the failure rate in the Republic was the same as the North. It’s 0.0015% there and 12% here. 8000 times higher. I’m glad something is going to be done about the continuous lies our telecoms regulator is telling.
According to the Sunday Times:
A DAIL committee is to examine whether ComReg, the telecom regulator, provided it with misleading information during an inquiry into Eircom’s broadband infrastructure, writes Mark Tighe.
Last June ComReg told the joint Oireachtas committee on communications, marine and natural resources that broadband failure rates in Northern Ireland “are broadly in line with our experience�. But Eircom’s own statistics show its broadband failure rate of 12% is much higher than the 1% claimed by BT in Northern Ireland.
From the Oireachtas minutes:
Bernard Durkan asked Isolde Goggin:
I draw her attention to line failure in broadband. We were not able to get information on the extent of that line failure because it is supposed to be commercially sensitive. Is ComReg aware of the extent of line failure resulting in an inability to provide broadband services?
Isolde Goggin answered:
We get information from Eircom about the rate of line failure and the time to repair, and issues regarding repeat faults and so on. Our experience of the number of lines connected to a broadband-enabled exchange that will fail the test appears to be in line with that in other countries. The experience in Northern Ireland, for example, bears that out.
In their written submission to the Oireachtas they were asked and answered, under the heading of:
Line failure in broadband enabled exchanges
Q8. Does ComReg collect data on line failure in broadband enabled exchanges?
Yes.Q9. Is ComReg satisfied or surprised with the amount and/or frequency of failures?
ComReg considers, from international experience, that some level of line failure is inevitable due, for instance, to long lines or the use of carriers. There are also a variety of ways of defining what represents a line failure and we are aware that different companies have differing approaches to the testing of lines. For instance, the current approach adopted by eircom may be overconservative, based on experience in the UK. While comparative data is difficult to obtain, it would appear that faults per 1,000 lines in NI are broadly in line with our experience.
Again I ask and I do so often, why is our regulator misleading the public and the Government?
Some google juice required to get this or the Ireland Offline site on the first page for a search for ‘comreg’.
For years the people that regulate communications, radio etc in this country have been a pack of self-serving, duplicitous cunts.
You have items on this blog post that should be raised as Parliamentary Questions in the Dail.
Are you allowed ask ‘Why are ComReg such lying cunts?” in the Dail?
I believe you can, as long as you stutter on every word.
ComReg are a total joke. They are an emasulated agency, with no powers. They recently informed me that “Broadband is unregulated so we can’t do anything about companies failing to provide a reliable broaband servcie”. This was in relation to ongoing NTL broaband flakiness. The government just passes the buck too. Write to the Minister for Communications on any issue relating to phones, broadband or whatever and you are automatically referred to “The Regulator”. The minister has no responsibility in this area, that is the job of Comreg being the usual response. I see a game of pass the parcel but no one ever gets the prize.
And as the parcel gets passed around, the taxpayers ante up to pay the salaries of those who “regulate” an industry designed to maximise shareholder value.
Another great post, I hope something will come of all this.
It’s amazing the hoops some of us have to jump through to get a broadband service that is still iffy at best.
comreg: “eircom has to provide functional internet access”. define “functional” why not put a number say 28k.
comreg: “eircom has to provide reasonable quality” how to you measure reasonable?
They are eircom lackeys. Just look at Smart.
I have dial up, no chance of broadband, running between 14 an 21.6 k. due to line quality. eircom and comreg’s answer you should be ahhpy you can talk on the line.