Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to speak on a matter of great importance to my electorate and that is the disgraceful behaviour of the Abbott government in pulling the plug on the NBN rollout. In my electorate, many places were starting to get connected.

Dr Southcott interjecting—

The member for Boothby might want to know that his office was not taking the phone calls of many residents who were trying to contact him to tell him about their distress. The response they got from his office was not supportive whatsoever. But I will stick up for all the residents in my electorate who need the National Broadband Network connected to their premises. We see the Minister for Communications come in here every day with hubris and arrogance. But what he is not doing is understanding the needs of local communities in my electorate.

We know that there were 18 or 19—the count is a little hazy—failed coalition broadband plans during the time they were last in government. Since that time, I have had over 700 people contact my office demanding they get the NBN to their premises. I have also started a petition on my website—and I have hundreds of responses from people in my electorate—urging the Abbott government to continue rolling it out to premises. Indeed, I have written to the Minister for Communications about this important matter. Unfortunately, he has once again displayed arrogance and hubris with his response, in which he says:

I find it remarkable that a member of parliament from South Australia claiming to represent the local interests of her community would demand that I continue Labor's fibre to the property national broadband network.

I do demand that because the residents in my electorate want it.

It is not only the people who sign my petition and the people who contact my office—the hundreds and hundreds. The demand for fibre to the premises is regularly evidenced in local papers. I have an article here from the Advertiser dated 16 November this year with the heading, 'Farmers market reaps NBN rewards' and another one from the Southern Times Messenger of 6 November titled 'Web road block'. These articles talk about people who are very upset that their small business or their home will not get fibre to the premises.

I seek leave to table these articles since the Minister for Communications does not seem to understand the needs of South Australians.

Leave not granted.

The Minister for Communications seems to think I am not representing my electorate very well. I would love him to come out to talk to the many hundreds of people in my electorate who want fibre to the premises. With the Liberal Party pulling the plug on the NBN, the suburbs of Aldinga Beach, Sellicks Beach, Moana, Seaford Rise, Maslin Beach, Old Noarlunga, Noarlunga, Noarlunga Downs, Seaford, Seaford Meadows and Port Noarlunga South have many residents who will not get the NBN.

Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Did you even connect one?

Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Excuse me, Member for Boothby, but we did connect many people and you are obviously in some sort of imaginary place.

Dr Southcott interjecting—

Why then will you not let me table these important articles which talk about the benefits of fibre to the premises? Are you scared of it? Is that the problem?

My residents want me to stand up for the NBN; they want me to stand up to ensure that it goes to the premises. The reason we need fibre to the premises is that the copper in the ground in the southern suburbs of Adelaide is inadequate. There are pair gains and there are RIM issues. Many premises do not have copper in the ground. The Liberal Party's plan to connect NBN to the node will mean that all those on poor copper connections will still not be able to get any faster broadband. They will not be able to get anything better. There is no plan from the Liberal Party—I have heard nothing from them—to say how they are going to deal with the issue of problems with the copper network. Are they going to re-lay more copper? If they re-lay more copper, surely they should just connect people to fibre? Surely the Liberal Party and the coalition government would just connect them to fibre?

This is a sore point for the coalition. They are not listening to the people of Australia and they are not listening to the people of the southern suburbs of Adelaide who want a genuine long-term fix for their internet problems. Unfortunately, I fear that we are going to see broadband plan No. 21 or 22 from the Liberal Party fail. I call on them to— (Time expired)