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

This is what the previous Prime Minister said:

What we are doing, right across the nation, is, region by region, locality by locality, working our way through the black spots as they arise.

That is what he said. He was systematic—he was absolutely systematic, I will give him that—and he was completely even-handed. Every locality was treated the same by the former Prime Minister—everybody got nothing. Not one cent was spent on mobile black spots across Australia. We are spending $100 million and a significant part of that will naturally be spent in Western Australia where there are so many black spots. Of course, when you get to the NBN's own wireless program, which was also a massive underperformer, the previous minister tried to explain away the problems by saying, 'We had not anticipated problems from there being so many tall trees.' Imagine, in regional Australia, tall trees! We must not be too hard on the previous minister, because his comment is understandable. You see, in Conrovia there are no trees—it is a complete wasteland.

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