The Investment, Industry and Information Technology Ministry confirmed that registrations from families without broadband Internet at home will be received at the registration fairs which will be held at Merchants Street, Valletta tomorrow and at the Ministry for Gozo on Sunday.

The number of applicants in the Blueskies initiative may very well exceed the initial target of 5,000. It should be clarified that contrary to wrong reporting in a section of the press, applications have not started being accepted by the ministry yet; and will only start being received at 9am tomorrow.

A section of the press appears to have misunderstood yesterday’s statement by Minister Austin Gatt, and implied in its reporting that no applications will indeed be received for the Blueskies scheme due to excess demand. This is not the case. Indeed, Dr Gatt remarked that the government would, if necessary, adjust its budgetary provision to ensure that all families without broadband at home, who register for a new subsidised account, will benefit from the scheme.

Non-profit organisations without a broadband account in their registered offices are also eligible for the scheme and are invited to avail themselves of tomorrow’s and Sunday’s registration event.

As with households without a broadband account, non-profit organisations will have their new broadband account subsidised to pay e3 a month for their first year of subscription. Households that include a person with disability will have the entire cost of their first year of broadband covered by the subsidy.

The ministry expressed gratitude to HSBC and BOV for their support for the scheme and for participating at the registration fairs with additional special offers for new participants.