Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister and refers to his answer to the last question. I refer the Deputy Prime Minister to the Treasurer’s claim on AM this morning that the provision of broadband in Australia is a matter for profit driven telecommunications companies alone. Can the Deputy Prime Minister confirm that the Telstra and G9 broadband plans endorsed by the Treasurer will only provide high-speed broadband services to Australians who live in the five capital cities, leaving regional and rural Australia absolutely high and dry? Or does the Deputy Prime Minister agree with statements made at the doors today by Senator Ron Boswell that ‘we’ve already got adequate broadband for people out there’?

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Mackellar, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. You have long ruled that preambles of the nature that the Leader of the Opposition has just used are quite out of order. The House of Representatives Practice makes it quite clear that to debate—

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member will resume her seat. I was listening carefully to the question raised by the Leader of the Opposition. I rule it in order, but he should not be asking for an opinion. I call the Deputy Prime Minister.

Mark Vaile (Lyne, National Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If I can address the second part of the Leader of the Opposition’s question, with regard to comments this morning, as is usual he selectively quotes from the doorstop. What Senator Boswell was referring to was that, with our package of $3.1 billion, broadband will be adequate in regional Australia, because we are going to start investing now and there will be a guarantee into the future to future proof consumers in regional Australia. Concerning the first part of the Leader of the Opposition’s question—

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Gillard interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Deputy Leader of the Opposition!

Mark Vaile (Lyne, National Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

now we know that he does not listen to the answers in the House. I just answered that question in my answer to the question from the member for Kalgoorlie—

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Gillard interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Deputy Leader of the Opposition is warned!

Mark Vaile (Lyne, National Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

when I outlined our strategy and what we have committed to future proofing rural and remote Australia.

Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Trade and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Crean interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Hotham is warned!

Mark Vaile (Lyne, National Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We understand how the market works. We have put a $2 billion capital investment in place to guarantee that there is an ongoing funding stream to pay for new technology that the market might not provide in rural and remote Australia. When the Labor Party thieves $2 billion from the seven million people living outside of the metropolitan areas in Australia, that opportunity will not be there. And that is the issue that the Leader of the Opposition should be addressing.

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, representing the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts. Would the minister inform the House how the government is assisting access to broadband, particularly in rural and regional areas?

Duncan Kerr (Denison, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Kerr interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Denison is warned!

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the minister aware of any alternative policies? What is our government’s response?

Peter McGauran (Gippsland, National Party, Deputy Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Riverina for her question. Since 2004, as a direct result of the government’s Broadband Connect program and its predecessor, HiBIS, more than one million additional premises have had access to metropolitan comparable broadband services, more than 200,000 additional consumers in regional Australia have been connected to broadband services and more than 1,500 additional exchanges have been ADSL enabled. And now the government’s $162½ million Australian Broadband Guarantee will provide universal broadband for all Australians, regardless of where they live, because anybody unable to gain a reasonable level of broadband service at their home or small business can receive a subsidised broadband service.

I am asked about alternative proposals. I have now had an opportunity to look very carefully at the Labor proposal as launched yesterday and found it to be utterly implausible and lacking entirely in credibility. There is nobody in the communications sector who for a moment thinks that its grand ambition can be nearly realised. I invite those who would not normally rush to read a Labor Party proposal or paper to look at it because, out of 20 pages, there is but one page of anything resembling details. It gives you some idea when so small amount of space is allocated to a massively complex and technical area. There are no maps or costings of the proposal. There are no details.

Then there are the funding figures. We are told that it is an $8 billion plan. By four o’clock yesterday afternoon, only a couple of hours after the press club launch, the communications spokesman, Senator Conroy, was telling Steve Price at 2UE that the number could be as high as $9 billion. Steve Price asked, ‘So we are up around the $10 billion mark, are we?’ Senator Conroy answered, ‘It is about $8 billion to $9 billion.’ The figures are going up already. What sort of costed proposal is this? But why worry? They will just dip into the Future Fund to top up any overspend.

Moreover, it is a stupid policy. It is stupid because the private sector was going to invest anyway. Telstra and the group of nine consortium were going to invest through the fibre-to-node program without any government funding assistance because they were going to invest in the commercial areas of built-up populations. Now they are laughing all the way to the bank because the Labor Party recklessly, negligently—

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms King interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Ballarat is warned!

Peter McGauran (Gippsland, National Party, Deputy Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

and incompetently are going to support the major telcos. There was no need to fund them. Instead, you have to fund the areas that miss out—regional, rural and remote Australia, outer suburban areas and so on. Labor are trashing the Future Fund and abolishing the telecommunications fund, which is targeted at regional and remote Australia, to support the big end of town. There can be nothing more stupid than that. There is nothing in the policy about pricing or affordability. No proposal can have credibility unless you address that. They do not address the issues of regulation. What is the regulatory regime? That is crucial to fostering private sector investment and the like.

Above all else, this proposal is anticompetitive. This will lock in Telstra as the sole network provider. Already the telcos know that Telstra is the only realistic bidder because the opposition has ruled out preventing or blocking Telstra from overbuilding any competitor’s network. We all remember the dual pay-TV rollout of the early 1990s—incompetently managed and devised by the then Labor government—where Telstra readily admits it overbuilt the Optus infrastructure network to stifle competition. They will do it again. Telstra is the only winner from this and so, of course, one or more of their ranks might be enthusiastic supporters. Labor is deserting regional and rural Australians. It is subsidising the big end of town unnecessarily. It is putting future generations of Australians at a disadvantage. I say again: you cannot trust Labor with money.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Can the Prime Minister confirm that since 2002 his government has launched 17 separate broadband programs and that, after these 17 different broadband programs, the World Economic Forum indicates that Australia is 25th in the world when it comes to available internet bandwidth? Can you explain why?

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before I call the Prime Minister, I remind the member for Melbourne that he should not use the word ‘you’ in a question.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My apologies, Mr Speaker. I will repeat the last part of the question. Can the Prime Minister explain why, after these 17 different broadband programs that the government has had in place since 2002, we are still only 25th in the world in access to internet bandwidth?

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I can certainly confirm—

Kim Wilkie (Swan, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Wilkie interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Swan is warned!

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

that the government has had a number of programs over a period of years. I will take the member at his word that it is 17. If you want active government, vote for us—we have all these programs. The reality is that we have the second highest take-up in the OECD. I noticed that the member did not mention that.

The real issue here is twofold. The first element of the debate is: why should money set aside for future generations be used to fund something that the private sector ought to provide itself? I think that is a very simple question. I think a question that, as public analysis of this debate proceeds, more and more people are going to ask is: why should $2.7 billion of public money that has been set aside for the liabilities of future generations be used to fund the provision of a service now that the private sector ought to provide itself? You can quote all the documents and interject and make noise as much as you like, but can I politely bring you back to the simple question: why should we use $2.7 billion that has been locked up for future generations to fund the provision of something that the private sector ought to provide in a normal market situation? That is a very simple proposition. That really goes to the essence of the issue.

The second issue is that what the Labor Party proposed yesterday was a return to the old days of the conflict between the regulator and the participant. The opposition will recall that one of the reasons we advanced as to the sale of Telstra—a sale that was vigorously opposed until yesterday by the Australian Labor Party—was the conflict between the government as owner and the regulator.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Australia Post!

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Melbourne has asked his question!

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Melbourne can carry on with that cacophony, but let us analyse what is really involved here. What you are doing is, in the words of ABN AMRO, taking the industry back 20 years to government provision, gold plating and restricted rollout. They are not my words; they are the words of one of the most respected economic analysts in Australia. That is what we are doing. There are two fundamental flaws. What Labor is proposing to do is to use $2.7 billion of the assets of future generations to fund provision that ought to be made by the private sector and, in the process, they are taking the regulation of this industry back 20 years.

I do not think that speaks of a party or group of men and women who have an idea of what we need in the future. Sure, broadband is important; there is no argument about that. The Leader of the Opposition got up and quoted me something that said broadband was important. That is not in debate. We are all in favour of broadband. But this side of Australian politics is not in favour of raiding the savings of our children and grandchildren in order to provide something that ought to be provided by the private sector through the normal operation of the market.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To put the Prime Minister’s mind at rest, I seek leave to table the 17 different government programs.

Leave not granted.