Communications minister Mr Ahern will today announce details of a €140 million plan to make high-speed telecommunications technology available to more than 350,000 people around the State.

The initiative will involve connecting 80 towns with populations varying between 1,500 and 16,700 through a broadband network and funding group broadband schemes for smaller communities where there is enough demand for the service.

The Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources has approval to spend a total of €140 million on the project between now and 2007. This will represent a spend of €35 million a year. Mr Ahern last week secured an extra €105 million for the scheme from the Government.

Under the plan, the Government will pay to connect the towns with the backbone broadband network. Telecoms providers will then be able to lease the lines at competitive rates and sell the services to consumers and business.

The current metropolitan area networks scheme, which involves 19 towns, is set to be completed in the middle of 2005 at a cost of €64 million. However, the Minister says he does not believe this goes far enough on delivering broadband to the State as a whole.

Mr Ahern will unveil details of the plan at a meeting of the Information Society Commission in Government Buildings later today. The largest town to benefit from the scheme will be Newbridge in Co Kildare, which has a population of 16,739; the smallest will be Moate, Co Westmeath.

The scheme will cover all towns with populations of more than 1,500 - 88 in all - and the list includes most sizeable settlements not included in the metropolitan area networks programme. The Department has also agreed to fund group broadband schemes for smaller communities. This will allow residents and businesses in these areas to pool their demand. The Department will provide half the cost of connecting these areas.

Mr Ahern said that both schemes would be delivered in partnership with the telecoms industry. "It is untenable in a modern society that so many have no access to broadband and no prospect of it," he said.

In its last report, the National Council for Competitiveness highlighted poor broadband access as a bar to economic development and urged the Government to address the problem.