Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to hold the government to account for failing to keep their promises on broadband, which is having a very significant effect on the lives of the people living in my electorate and the businesses operating in Hotham. In August 2013, the communications minister promised that the live rollout of broadband would be commenced in mid-2014. Unfortunately, the NBN that was promised to us was a second-rate NBN—one that will not equip us for the 21st century and one that, unfortunately, will have to be upgraded more or less continuously over the years to come. Even with this second-rate NBN, the rollout is way behind schedule. During the election, the coalition promised they would deliver the NBN to 11.3 million households by the end of 2016, but the budget papers revealed that, at best, just 3.1 million homes and businesses will have the NBN by September 2016. In my electorate of Hotham, the only homes with any form of NBN are those that benefited from construction that was undertaken under the former Labor government—that is, households connected to fibre in Springvale South.

It might be news to some people in this chamber, but many of my constituents in Hotham lack access to even basic ADSL services. Deputy Speaker Griggs, you would know that I do not represent a rural electorate. I am talking about people who live within 20 kilometres of the Melbourne CBD. So bad is the port availability in Heatherton in my electorate that a number of residents have been in touch to tell me that they simply cannot get access to the internet at all. One of the affected families is an IT professional and his partner, who is a medical professional. They have two young children living in their household and the family does not have any internet access. They told me they are considering moving suburbs because they are struggling so much without this very basic thing that they need to survive as modern people living in our country. I find it extraordinary that a family living within metropolitan Melbourne is in the situation. I am very sad to report that these are not isolated incidents. I receive similar complaints from people living in Dingley Village and Cheltenham, where residents are being forced to rely on dial-up.

Sadly, this is not a problem affecting homes just in my area. Recently, seven mayors of the municipalities around South East Melbourne wrote to the Minister for Communications to beg for improved access to broadband for our manufacturers. I represent an area where thousands of people in the car industry are going to lose their jobs over the coming years, yet 85 per cent of businesses that are operating in this area are relying on ADSL. This is a disgrace. We need to get our nation into the 21st century and part of that is by building a world-class broadband network. We need to get with the movement.

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