Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The previous Rudd-Gillard-Rudd Labor governments left behind an absolute fiscal shambles. Indeed, we can all agree that they had the Midas touch in reverse when it came to delivering on projects, from the pink batts tragedy, which not only cost lives but cost more to remove than install, to overpriced school halls or, in Mt. Crosby's case in my electorate, an undersized concrete slab with only two walls, to the financial fiasco of them all—NBN Co.

When the coalition came to office, Labor could no longer hide the disaster that was their NBN Co. We learned that Labor's own financial advisers warned that the NBN project had a negative net present value of around $30 billion. The project was forecast to lose money for taxpayers from day one. Yet, despite these warnings, Labor always refused to refer their multibillion dollar fiasco to the Productivity Commission for proper analysis, which could have delivered a more cost-effective outcome and saved taxpayers billions of dollars. To have proceeded with the NBN, regardless, is a level of fiscal recklessness we have not seen before in Australia.

The NBN Co carried out its Strategic Review from October to December last year to objectively estimate the true cost of, and timetable for, completing Labor's fibre-to-the-premises NBN and alternative layout options. The review found that, if Labor's NBN proceeded, it would cost $72.6 billion—yet another $29 billion more than the public were told—and would take until 2024, after originally promising completion by 2016

On taking office, the coalition government was duty bound to revise the NBN rollout maps. Labor's maps were simply wrong. It was revealed that Labor's definition of 'construction commenced' was directly at odds with most people's understanding of what those words meant. In fact, no on-site construction of any kind needed to have occurred for this definition to apply. Now most people do not consider 'construction commenced' on, say, a house or office building, where the only action to occur is for instructions to an architect to draw up the plans. This misleading rhetoric is not used or accepted by any construction companies around the world—but then again NBN Co did live in a world of its own.

The coalition believes in being open and honest with Australians about the true state of the NBN rollout. For example, we believe that if you live in regional Queensland, we should not tell you that construction has commenced in your street, when in actual fact, all that has happened is that a network planner has drawn up a map while sitting in an office in Sydney. Labor's NBN was going to cost a fortune for everyday families, lifting broadband costs by up to 80 per cent or an additional $43 per month. Labor went to the 2013 election promising 1.13 million premises would get fibre connections by 30 June 2014—yes, this month. But NBN Co had informed the then Labor government that the fibre would be revised downwards by 500,000 premises, a fact the Labor government failed to tell the public prior to the election. In July 2013, Labor told 250,000 households and businesses they were eligible for the Interim Satellite Service, yet by December 2013 the 1SS reached its capacity of only 48,000 customers and registration closed. Labor spent $351 million on the 1SS— $7300 per user—yet it only delivers a dial-up service to many users. In April the coalition government moved to fix Labor's mistakes by committing $34 million to improve the 1SS and improve service quality for existing users and proceed with new connections.

The coalition government is spelling out the facts about NBN Co's performance, instead of misleading the Australian people. The coalition is committed to rolling out the National Broadband Network as quickly as possible, at less cost to taxpayers and more affordably for consumers. Since September 2013 the coalition government has put the project back on track and now twice as many Australians are using the NBN from when we took over. In nine months the number of premises covered has increased by 65 per cent from 348,000 to 573,000. The coalition government has a plan to ensure all parts of the nation are properly serviced. The coalition government has approved NBN Co's recommendation that the rollout proceed using a multi-technology mix that matches the right technology to the right locations and leverages existing infrastructure where appropriate. This approach will save taxpayers $31 billion, get the NBN finished four years sooner and enable nine out of ten Australians in the fixed-line footprint to get download speeds of 50 megabits per second or more by as soon as 2019. The most reprehensible part of this is that the residents of Brisbane City Council could have had fibre to the premises—(Time expired)

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