Michelle Rowland (Greenway, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In July 2012, the ACCC authorised the NBN Co-Optus HFC subscriber agreement. This was for the migration of Optus's HFC subscribers to the NBN and the decommissioning of parts of the Optus HFC network. I quote from the ACCC's statement:

The ACCC accepts that Optus is unlikely to undertake the large investment required to allow Optus to offer significantly faster products on the HFC network than those currently available. The Optus HFC network would, therefore, only provide a close substitute to the NBN for customers seeking broadband services at the lower end of the range of services that the NBN will support.

Interestingly, I noted this fact in an opinion piece I wrote on 14 November 2013 following a visit by the now Prime Minister to Blacktown—to a part of Blacktown that happens to be in the member for Chifley's electorate. He basically came out and said, 'Blacktown, you've got it good enough guys. You've got it good enough!' He basically claimed there was no need for a fibre-to-the-premises NBN rollout in Blacktown for two reasons: firstly, Blacktown, apparently, is already serviced by existing Optus and Telstra HFC infrastructure; and, secondly, speeds of 100 megabits per second are already available to end users from services currently provided over that infrastructure. Well the chickens are coming home to roost. As I noted then, the reality is that the end-user services provided over such cable technology are heavily user dependent. The more users at any given time, the less speeds available. The Optus HFC infrastructure, in particular, is not dimensioned for a significant number of users. In fact, the ACCC, as I just quoted, has recently stated that Optus is unlikely to make the investment to support higher speeds on its HFC network, and that Optus HFC does not represent a substitute for the higher-speed services that Labor's NBN would deliver. In contrast, the services provided using fibre under the NBN are not as susceptible to speed degradation as the number of users increases.

On the issue of speed, while we are here, it is completely incorrect to make broad claims of 100 megabits per second being available under existing infrastructure. Such speeds are not available to all end users, which is why service providers use the terminology 'speeds up to'—up to. In fact, consumer complaints and investigation and enforcement are some of the reasons those service providers do not even make the kinds of broad claims that the then communications minister made then. Even the retail contracts do not contain such speeds. We are talking here about downloads. What about the upload? What is the upload speed on the Telstra or Optus HFC?

Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The telcos would be sued.

Michelle Rowland (Greenway, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They would indeed be sued. Generally, you would be getting about one to two megabits per second, if you are lucky. As I said, these little chickens are coming home to roost. As in the headline from David Ramli, 'NBN faces double cost hit on ageing Optus network'. We know that the Prime Minister yesterday would not—or could not—even support the assertions he made only a couple of years ago. I quote from David Ramli:

NBN Co spent $800 million—

that is your and my money—

to buy and reuse Optus' cable network. Now it may be forced to invest another $375 million to rebuild parts of the fading network because it isn't capable of delivering high-speed broadband to enough people.

What did the ACCC say in 2012? We have known this for years. Under this Prime Minister, the cost of his second-rate NBN—in April 2013, he said it would cost $29.5 billion. In December 2013, he said it would be $41 billion. In August this year, it was $56 billion. Just have a look at what their rollout plan, released in October, is based on. As was very aptly said by the shadow minister, it has a trajectory that even Evel Knievel could not jump! And it is predicated on HFC being a primary delivery mechanism for this, predicated on HFC.

This financial year, nbn co said it would connect 953,000 homes and businesses to the NBN in the fixed-line footprint, ramping up in the next two financial years to 6.2 million homes and businesses—predicated on the HFC. This Prime Minister promised minimum speeds to everyone by 2016. These premises are not going to receive the NBN until 2019 at the earliest. Meanwhile, residents in Blacktown, in the electorate of the member for Chifley and my own electorate, await decent broadband services under this government.