Gary Gray (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development and Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

The issue of broadband and the broadband network is something that was brought into sharp focus in the course of the last 12 months and ultimately became one of the significant reasons for the change of government in November last year. In Western Australia and in my electorate of Brand—the southern metropolitan area of Perth—broadband issues are profound. Broadband issues significantly constrain small business activities. One small business in my electorate is run by a very active businesswoman, Esther Grogan. Her home business is a secretarial service, and she has been desperately in need of a significant upgrade to the broadband connectivity to her home in order for her to carry out her domestic business. I am pleased that through the budgeting process a substantial step forward has been made to create the framework for the delivery of a broadband network that will serve all Australians and, in particular, the southern metropolitan area of Perth.

I am reminded of the importance of government policy and government initiatives interlocking and creating a stronger fabric for strengthening both our communities and our communal activities. Last week in my electorate of Brand we received the very first computers of the computers in schools program. The connection between the computers in schools and broadband availability is obvious. We now have schools with a profound capacity to deliver computers to students, at a ratio of one machine to two students, and we have schools making incredible use of that capacity. Not only can students now take their work home with them via either a laptop or a home connection but parents can enter into a monitoring process to understand better the lessons that their children are undertaking and the progress of their children through the schooling system. What that means is that availability of broadband services to the home is particularly important. It is important for business, for education and for building a society that works in an effective way in the kind of future world that we can all envisage for our kids and for our families.

When I contemplate the rapid expansion of homes through the southern metropolitan area of Perth and the very large number of new homes being built with the expectation that those homes would be connected to broadband services and that families paying top dollar for those lots would be able to access not only good housing but also housing which is connected to a broadband network and at speeds that are meaningful for families, then this particular policy framework, which we announced prior to the election and which we take steps to deliver through this budget, is particularly important. The small businesses in my electorate extend from businesses which operate in the industrial precincts to growing businesses that operate from homes. Having the availability of significant network speeds to be able to carry out business from home and to be able to work in an environment that makes most sense to small business owners is extremely important to people in my electorate. The repeated petitions to my office directed to me particularly by Esther Grogan and her group of small business people bring home in sharp focus the importance of the program of getting broadband connections into communities and homes and allowing these businesses to grow in a way that makes sense to families and to those people who are trying to make those businesses work. I commend the government on the initiatives it has taken so far. I look forward to watching in future budgets as this program grows and we connect our suburbs, our homes, our families and our schools as part of the growing connectivity and connection to the world that is available to them through adequate broadband networks.

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