Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

You would be amazed. The creative industries are now bigger than movies. Entertainment—games and other things—is now bigger than movies.

We know that these are all important reasons for people to have access to high-speed broadband. And that is particularly so in Northern Adelaide, which has traditionally had very bad access to broadband, because when many of these suburbs were expanded there was a pair gain used on nearly all of the exchanges. I happen to live in one of these suburbs, Burton, and know the frustration that people suffered when they wanted to get access to broadband and were stuck on dial-up and other things.

We have just seen Telstra—rather fortunately, after quite some time—undertake to fix this matter in Blakeview, Davoren Park and Craigmore. They will now be able to provide ADSL2+. So there are some small measures that have been going on in the meantime, by Telstra, but it has been a very frustrating time, indeed.

If you look at the electorate of Wakefield at a glance, in terms of the National Broadband Network some 40,900 homes will be connected—if you include Salisbury North, which is currently in the electorate but sadly being moved out as a result of a redistribution, and Nuriootpa, which has 3,800 homes, including Greenock and Penrice. There are places like Balaklava, which has 1,000 homes; Clare, with 1,500 homes and business; Elizabeth, with 21,800 homes, 20,000 homes in Graigmore, Elizabeth Downs, Elizabeth East, The Grove, The Parks, The South, The Vale and The West, Hillbank and others. There are 600 homes in Freeling, 1,200 in my home town of Kupunda, 700 in Riverton and 900 in Tarlee. And 9,400 homes are going to be connected in Gawler, which is part of the one-year plan. Evanston and Evanston Gardens, Evanston Park, Gawler, Gawler Belt, Gawler East, Gawler South, Gawler West, Hewett and Willaston—all suburbs in the town of Gawler—are going to be connected. Work is going to commence from February 2013, in phases of work that are scheduled over a year.

These are rather important things for this town. It is a tremendous place to live. It is a place that is dominated by small business. I know that there are many small-business owners and many people who work from home who want to be able to do that in Gawler. And that is why it is surprising to see the Liberal Party's reaction to this—constantly disputing the need for it and constantly nit-picking about the National Broadband Network, when the member for Wentworth can actually get a question. I think the fact that the member for Wentworth cannot get a question in this place was raised in the joint party room of the coalition.

The Liberal Party want to tear up broadband in this electorate. I know my opponent, Tom Zorich—he is a lovely bloke but a little clueless at times—has now joined with Tony Abbott to commit to a policy platform that would tear up broadband in Gawler and tear up broadband for Elizabeth and places like Balaklava, Clare, Two Wells and Riverton. And I do not think that is very sensible. I do not think it is in the nation's interest. And I certainly do not think it is in the interests of the northern suburbs or Gawler or in the interests of all those small towns to the north of Gawler, where people need broadband as desperately as they need mobile phones and every other communication device. This is a very important nation-building project, and we hope to see it completed and brought to fruition.

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