Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Government Services and the Digital Economy) Share this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to speak on the National Broadband Network Companies Amendment (Commitment to Public Ownership) Bill 2024. The National Broadband Network was first dreamt up as a policy by former Labor senator Stephen Conroy in the lead up to the 2007 election. It was an ill-thought-through, careless and lazy piece of policy. I was so frustrated by it that I wrote a book, Wired Brown Land?, about the broadband battles in Australia. The book came out in 2009, and I'm often asked, 'How did it sell?' Well, for a book about telecommunication economics, extremely well!

My central point was that the policy that then Senator Conroy devised dismally failed because it sought to get Telstra to do something that it did not want to do—namely, to build a national fibre-to-the-node network for $4.7 billion and give its competitors access to that network. An even more ill conceived policy was then dreamt up by Stephen Conroy and Kevin Rudd. Notoriously, the details were sketched out on the back of a beer coaster on a flight on a government jet. Under that policy, the commitment was to spend what was supposed to be $43 billion on a fibre-to-the-premises network. If you go back and look at what was promised in the 2009 media release and press conference by Kevin Rudd, Stephen Conroy, Wayne Swan and Lindsay Tanner, just about every aspect of what they promised has been a manifest failure. As a result of this policy, some $30 billion of taxpayers' money has been spent, and the value for money taxpayers have received has been absolutely appalling, in stark contrast to the frugal Kiwis, who managed to get a national fibre network for a total taxpayer commitment of NZ$1.5 billion.

In the nearly 15 years I've been in the parliament, and having taken quite an interest in this issue, I've spoken many times on stupid pieces of legislation associated with Labor's National Broadband Network, yet the bill before the parliament today achieves an unenviable distinction. It is the most stupid, pointless, empty, nakedly political, entirely useless piece of cynical performative-gesture politics that Labor has managed to serve up in its nearly two decades of deeply undistinguished policymaking on the National Broadband Network.

In the time available to me I'd like to make three points: (1) Labor's record on the NBN is hopeless, (2) the policy framework on future ownership of the NBN was established by the Rudd government under Stephen Conroy as minister—and, indeed, it was his then representative in the House, the now Prime Minister, who explained what that policy framework would be, and (3) the bill before the House today which proposes to change that policy framework—which, for some 15 years, Labor has thought was absolutely fine—is a naked, meaningless, cynical and empty political stunt, and the coalition will be voting against it.

Let me start with the proposition that Labor's record on the NBN is hopeless. As I've already indicated, the plan they announced in 2007 completely failed because Telstra's then management team refused to cooperate. So they announced another plan in 2009. Kevin Rudd promised that his government would build a National Broadband Network that would serve 90 per cent of homes with access speeds of up to 100 megabits per second, take eight years to complete and cost $43 billion. None of this was achieved.

Let's judge what Labor delivered by the time it left office in 2013 against what had been promised in NBN's 2012 corporate plan. Labor promised 286,000 premises passed by June 2013. NBN Co fell a full 100,000 premises, or almost 40 per cent, short of its target, and, of the premises it claimed, many were designated as so-called service class 0 or service class 1, meaning they could not actually provide a service at all.

Labor was systematically dishonest about what the NBN was delivering. And the man who was communications minister at the time is Australia's current Prime Minister, the man who just loves being upgraded to seat 1A. Let me remind you what happened. In August 2013, during the election campaign, the then Minister for Communications, the member for Grayndler, stood in front of a big red button and announced that broadband was now available to 5,400 homes and businesses in Sydney's western suburbs: 'It's fantastic to see that the NBN fibre network is now available,' he said. What he didn't say is that close to 1,000 of these were service class 0, and 98.6 per cent of these homes had no fibre connection to them. By the time of the 2013 federal election, NBN Co said it had passed 209,000 premises, but close to 80 per cent of these had no fibre going into the home. It was not fibre to the premises; it was fibre to the press release.

When the coalition took over responsibility for the NBN we set about fixing the problem in a methodical way. Our 2013 strategic review recommended using a combination of rollout technologies—the multitechnology mix. Had we continued with Labor 's model it would have taken up to five years longer to complete the rollout and would have cost billions of dollars more. If we'd stuck to Labor 's plan then, when the pandemic hit and millions of Australians moved overnight to working and studying from home, Australia would have been in a dreadful mess. But, thanks to the coalition's work, the NBN was ready for the challenge, with 98 per cent of premises around the country—over 11 million—able to connect in early 2020.

I've said it before and I'm very pleased to say it again: as the communications minister when the pandemic hit Australia, I am enormously proud of the efforts made across Australia's telecommunications sector. NBN Co, Optus, Telstra, TPG, Vodafone, Aussie Broadband and a whole range of other companies came together to keep the network operating when Australians desperately needed it, and that was critical to the way our nation was able to get through the pandemic.

Let me turn now to Labor 's policy framework on NBN ownership. This is the framework developed by Labor and legislated in 2011. It carefully sets out the steps that, in the judgement of the Labor Party, would need to happen before the NBN could be sold by the government to private owners. Let me quote from the minister's second reading speech in this place on the National Broadband Network Companies Act 2011:

The first bill in the package, the NBN companies bill, obligates NBN Co. Ltd to limit its operations to, and focus them on, wholesale-only telecommunications. It also sets out arrangements for the eventual sale of the Commonwealth's stake in the company once the NBN rollout is complete, including provisions for independent and parliamentary reviews prior to any privatisation, and for the parliament to have the final say on the sale. The bill also creates a power for the Governor-General to make regulations concerning future private ownership and control of NBN Co. Ltd, and establishes other relevant reporting, governance and enforcement mechanisms.

As such, the bill deals with arrangements for both today and into the future.

I remind the House that these are not my words; I'm quoting the words of the then minister, the member for Grayndler, now the Prime Minister. He went on to say:

Taking into account the recommendations of the implementation study on the NBN, the Commonwealth will retain full ownership of NBN Co. Ltd until the rollout of the NBN is complete.

He then went on to say:

After the communications minister has declared that the rollout is complete, the productivity minister may direct the Productivity Commission to undertake a 12-month inquiry into a number of matters. These may include the regulatory framework for the NBN, and the impacts of a sale of NBN Co. Ltd on the Commonwealth budget, consumer outcomes and competition. Within 15 sitting days of the Productivity Commission inquiry report being tabled, a parliamentary joint committee on the ownership of NBN Co. Ltd is to be established, according to the practice of parliament, to examine the report of the Productivity Commission inquiry. This joint committee will report to both houses of parliament within 180 days of its appointment. After it reports, the finance minister may, by disallowable instrument, advise that conditions are suitable for an NBN Co. Ltd sale scheme.

As is clear from this extensively quoted material, the minister of the day laid out a clear framework which needed to apply before the National Broadband Network could be sold. He did not say the NBN could never be sold. Instead, he set out a comprehensive series of steps which would need to occur before the parliament was given the opportunity to consider an instrument, prepared by the finance minister, advising that conditions were suitable for an NBN sale scheme.

Of course what this means is that under the existing legislation, unless both houses of parliament agree, no sale can occur. As I have informed the House, the minister who explained these required stages to the House so carefully and thoroughly in his second reading speech is, of course, the member for Grayndler, the current Prime Minister, enthusiastic recipient of air-travel upgrades and keen real estate investor.

Let us be clear: there is a comprehensive framework in the legislation, developed and passed by the Australian Labor Party, setting out all the things that would have to happen before the NBN could be sold. Critically, one of those steps involves the tabling of a disallowable instrument—that is, an instrument which can be disallowed by a majority vote of parliamentarians in either house. No privatisation could occur unless there was majority support for it in the parliament. That has been the policy setting since 2011—the policy settings devised and implemented by the Australian Labor Party.

Given the realities I have just explained, any reasonable observer would ask: what is the possible point of the bill which is before the House now? Given that privatisation of the NBN could not occur unless a majority in both houses of parliament agreed to it, what possible additional work does the bill before the House do today? The answer is clear. It does no substantive or real work at all. That is why I say this bill is the most stupid, pointless, empty, nakedly political, entirely useless piece of cynical, performative gesture politics that Labor has managed to serve up in its nearly two decades of deeply undistinguished policymaking on the NBN. That is why the coalition will be voting against it.

This is not the first time the current Prime Minister and his communications minister have tried on this particular stunt. Similarly, in the lead up to the 2022 election, they tried to bring on a big political fight about whether there was some difference between the parties about the future of the NBN. On 17 November 2021, this dynamic duo issued a media release containing this ringing commitment: 'Labor will also keep the NBN in public hands.' It attracted virtually no attention then and it's not attracting much attention now.

This is a non-issue. The existing legislative framework, introduced in a rich irony by the current Prime Minister in 2011, sets out very clearly what has to happen before the National Broadband Network could ever pass out of public ownership. It cannot happen unless there is majority support for it in both houses of parliament.

If the member for Grayndler and the member for Greenway had any capacity for shame left, if they had any self-knowledge at all, they would be curled up on the floor in writhing agonies of embarrassment at having brought forward this ludicrous bill. I say, for the third time, this bill is the most stupid, pointless, empty, nakedly political, entirely useless piece of cynical, performative gesture politics that Labor has managed to serve up in its nearly two decades of deeply undistinguished policymaking on the NBN.

I say to anybody who is listening tonight, you should be very cross that the Prime Minister and the minister have wasted the time of the national parliament on this ludicrous joke of a bill. I am very pleased to say the coalition will be having nothing to do with this useless bill.

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