Janelle Saffin (Page, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in strong support of the Telecommunications Legislation Amend­ment (Fibre Deployment) Bill 2011 and I do so for the following reasons. Firstly, it gives effect to the general policy of establishing a nationally consistent, high-speed broadband network to 93 per cent of premises, including residential and others, to provide download internet speeds of 100 megabits per second, and provide fixed wireless to four per cent of premises and satellite to three per cent of premises, including households, at a speed of at least 12 megabits per second. The national network will similarly be open access and wholesale only. This legislation also speaks to a particular part of the NBN policy framework, fibre in new developments. The January ministerial statement articulated that:

NBN Co. ... would be the wholesale provider of last resort in new developments within or adjacent to its long-term fibre footprint and meet the associated cost of this obligation.

It is really important that this is legislated as new developments are rolled out to ensure we are not left behind. The Telecom–munications Legislation Amendment (Fibre Deployment) Bill amends the Telecom–munications Act and that supports the policy that fibre-to-the-premises infrastructure has to be installed in new developments. The bill also reflects the policy that NBN Co. will be the fibre provider of last resort. It adds a new part to the Telecommunications Act to support the rollout of the NBN. It will apply to all types of new developments, including the broadacre estates, the urban infill and urban renewal projects. It will generally apply to new developments in NBN Co.'s long-term fibre footprint.

There are other provisions in the bill that give effect to this key objective. It requires developers that are constitutional corpor­ations, and we know that has a particular legal meaning, to install fibre-ready passive infrastructure in developments. That is where the long-term fibre footprint of the NBN is. It provides ministerial authority to determine specifications for fibre-ready passive infrastructure, if required. It will allow carriers to access the passive infrastructure that is owned by non-carriers and also, importantly, it will provide for the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to be the default arbitrator. Also, it will enable the minister to specify developments in which fixed lines must be optical fibre and determine specifications for such lines. And it has a number of other provisions in it that give effect to the key objective.

The bill gives effect to a particular part of our policy but it also gives effect to the whole policy on the NBN, so I will make some comments that go to the whole and to the general. I have been very active in my local community as a champion of early NBN rollout on the North Coast. One thing I was able to do was to bring together a large group of people who wanted the NBN first. Everybody wants the NBN; that is understandable. It is an eight-year rollout, so we cannot all be first, but if you were NBN-ready then you stood a good chance of getting one of the early rollouts, and we did that on the North Coast. The place was Coffs Harbour, which I call the 'nerve centre' of the NBN rollout.

I worked with the local university, Southern Cross University, in particular with Professor Peter Croll, who is still at the university working on this, to get a submission ready. I also worked with 14 local councils across the North Coast and with local businesses. We were able to put in a submission which said, 'We are NBN ready,' and it was recognised that we were able to take advantage of the rollout.

The NBN Co. CEO, in announcing the site, said that sites were selected on a range of technical and engineering criteria and that the engagement of local government and the receptiveness of communities to broadband initiatives were factors taken into consid­eration. We had those three key elements present: we had the technical and engineering criteria because of the spine that goes up the east coast, we had the engagement of local government—and it was really strong engagement—and we had receptive communities.

This shows how out of step the opposition are. They come in here and talk about the NBN as though it were something that people in Australia were not receptive to. People are receptive all across Australia. We have communities right across Australia saying: 'We want to be in the early rollout. When is it coming? Is it happening now?' Of course it cannot 'happen now' everywhere. It is happening as fast as possible, but it is a huge undertaking. As we have all said, it is akin to building the Snowy project, not only in its size but in what it means for our development and our future. Surveys in my area have found that local businesses—small businesses in particular—know that they need it to be competitive and to stay on top of things. It is not as if we were introducing something 'out there', which is what you would think in listening to the opposition talk about it. They talk about how people could have wireless, but that is ridiculous. Wireless cannot replace it, and I will come to that now.

In speaking about the general policy—and this goes to the whole debate—I will refer to some of the myths around the NBN. The website nbnmyths.wordpress.com brings this together very nicely under the heading 'The top 10 NBN myths debunked'. The first one is: 'The NBN will cost taxpayers $43 billion. We can't afford it and it's uncosted'. The website says:

False

First, the government investment is capped at $26-27 billion, not 43. The remainder will come from revenue and NBN Co’s private debt.

It then has a whole lot more to say about the claim, that the project was not studied and costed. What was the KPMG-McKinsey implementation study if the project was not studied and costed? It found that the network could be built for $42.8 billion—that was prior to the deal with Telstra—would not have any net cost to the government and would have an estimated net value of $40 billion in 2025, earning a return on invest­ment of six to seven per cent, which is more than enough to repay debt and equity used to build the project. It just makes good sense. The website cites the NBN business case summary, saying it revealed the total cost of the network to be lower than the initial $43 billion estimate. If people just read, all the information and facts are there.

The second myth that is debunked is: 'If it were viable, the private sector would build it'. That is completely false. The private sector have had a long time to build it and they have not done it, because the private sector do not usually initiate and undertake nation-building projects that are of benefit to the whole country, that provide the infrast­ructure for the whole country to take advantage of in health, education, small business, farming and agriculture—in a whole range of areas. The private sector could not and would not afford it. Are parts of the private sector going to join together and say, 'Yes, let's initiate this project worth over $40 billion'? That is a huge investment for any company and well beyond any telco I know of that is operating in Australia. The website says:

The private sector demand a ROI of at least 12%, because they need to earn a profit for their shareholders. The NBN has a projected 6-7% ROI—

which is a good return to cover any debt. The private sector just would not deal with that. It says:

… while this is well below commercial rates, it's quite acceptable for a Government, which is not seeking to earn a profit.

There are a few other myths, such as, 'We'll never need that much speed or data'. That is completely ridiculous. If you have a look at the increase in the speed of internet access in Australia and what we will have, you see the only way we can maintain this is with a fibre based system and a holistic one to start off with. There is another myth: no-one else in the world is installing such a system. That is false and ridiculous. Fibre to the premises or the home is currently being rolled out across Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan and China. It is ridiculous to say that it is not happening in other places. The OECD actually recommends that governments build fibre to the premises networks—so the OECD does recommend it. If national governments do not do it, then who will do it? It is one of those responsibilities that we have as a government to provide that infrastructure. South Korea have announced that they are now spending US$26 billion on upgrading their old 100 megabits per second FTTP network to deliver speeds of one gigabyte, the same as the Australian NBN. This is happening even though they already have a 4G wireless network.

One of the other myths is our internet speed is good enough. That is ridiculous. The facts speak for themselves. I do not even have to go through what the technical parts are. We know that is not true. When you have a look at average speeds, you see the dismal position of Australia's internet speeds. Then there is the other one: a wireless network that can be 4G, LTE, WiMax or DSL—ADSL2+/VDSL/HDSL—can provide the same speed for a fraction of the price. That is false. Much is claimed, usually by those with a vested interest—and that means a vested commercial interest or a political interest—to try to tear it down, because we know that is what the opposition do; they are not interested in nation-building projects like this. Much is claimed about the potential of wireless networks, with speeds such as 300 megabits per second being quoted. But this is highly deceptive, because those are peak speeds per tower, not realistically achievable speeds for individuals. If you have the 300 megabits per second tower and you have two users on it, then that speed would be halved to 150 megabits per second. A trial of 4G/LTE in 2009 showed that with just 20 people using any one tower the speed plummeted to just seven megabits per second. We know that distance, topography, buildings and weather also degrade those available speeds. All this information is available and it does not find its way easily into the debate because all you hear from the opposition is, 'No, we're just going to tear this down. We don't care about it.' They had 12 years to do it. Nineteen attempts failed miserably.

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