 The proposal was resisted by the Alliance Party, which viewed it as "power grab" by the Democratic Unionist Party and Sinn Féin, but was approved on 18 January 2012.No timescale for the abolition was outlined and the department remained in operation, as of late March 2012.DETI was heavily criticised by the Northern Ireland Audit Office for its mismanagement of a broadband scheme starting in 2004 and carried out by Bytel Networks, which saw Bytel receive over a million euros in a European Union grant for equipment that was never used.