Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Communications and Broadband) Share this | Hansard source

I refer the minister to some correspondence he produced earlier this week between himself and Telstra in 2009. He wrote to Telstra on 27 March 2009 raising a concern from a Mr Yossi Berger about asbestos-containing material in Telstra pits. Telstra wrote back on 28 April, in a letter the minister has distributed in the press gallery, in which Richard Coleman said:

Such pits are only removed and replaced in situations where they have suffered significant damage and therefore present a hazard. When serviceable pits remain in situ, they are not considered to present a risk to health and safety of any person.

The minister wrote again, in August 2009, pressing Mr Berger's argument that all the pits should be replaced. Then he received a reply on 13 August 2009 from Michael Rocca, then the head of network services, who wrote:

It is Telstra's opinion the proposals of Mr Berger do not achieve a satisfactory balance between commercial practicability and the actual health risk posed by in-ground pits that contain bonded asbestos cement. The potential higher risk for disturbance of in situ asbestos plant is recognised within the Code of Practice for the Safe Removal of Asbestos, 2nd edition 2005, which states:

The removal of asbestos-containing materials can potentially expose workers and others to higher levels of … fibres than leaving the materials in situ.

The minister wrote back again, to Mr Thodey this time, the chief executive, and made the point in his letter, dated 2 November, that, when such ACM materials are disturbed, organisations, employees and contractors can be exposed to fibres. And he suggested a formal program of total removal would be a great legacy. Mr Thodey wrote back and, in his letter of 14 December, said:

Given the low risk of in situ pits, the potential risks of removal and the prohibitive associated costs, we do not believe a proactive pit removal process is justified at the time.

What this demonstrates is that, in 2009, the minister was very aware—very aware indeed—that there was asbestos-containing material in Telstra's pits. He was aware that Telstra had a view, supported by the industry standards, that they are safe if they are intact and left in situ and undamaged, and that health risks arise when they are disturbed. Of course, at that time they were being disturbed rarely, only when maintenance was required or trucks ran into them and so forth. However, by 2011, the deal that was done between NBN Co. and Telstra, of course, involved the disturbance of almost all of these pits on a massive, nationwide scale. From 2011, there have been reports in the press of asbestos being found in the works being conducted either by NBN Co. or by Telstra as part of the NBN project. There was a 2011 report in the Age, on page 6 of the 5 May edition; on 13 December last year there were reports about contamination found in Western Australia; and there have been a number of reports earlier this year as well.

I am hoping the minister will take the opportunity to enlighten us here, but, notwithstanding the fact that all of these pits were going to be disturbed so that the whole context changed dramatically with the NBN deal, and notwithstanding that there were reports of asbestos contamination, he does not appear to have raised concerns about them, having been put on notice in 2009, either with the communications minister or with NBN and Telstra prior to last week, when the matter became a very hot issue, as we all know, in the Sydney media. I could refer the minister, of course, to the questions that my colleague the member for Bradfield and others have raised in the various committees and the Senate estimates, but I imagine he does not pay much attention to questions from the opposition.

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