Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It will surprise many people here that the worst broadband in the nation, for both quality and access, is in the humble seat of Bowman. That is all about to change this Friday, when they will connect 4,300 homes to fibre to the node—six to eight years earlier than when Labor was going to roll in the trucks, and for $20 to $30 billion less. Those homes will get the fast broadband they have been waiting decades for. It will not be another Labor scheme that never comes to fruition.

Ms Ryan interjecting—

That is right, yes. You never see a bad idea you cannot fund—that Labor Party over there—and there are always 100 bureaucrats to make sure they spend the money quickly. We are doing it wisely in Bowman: it is being connected up to Redland Bay-Mount Cotton in August. What we are seeing is a game changer for those families. They should not have to wait until 2020 and beyond, and certainly not for the rolled gold promises of Bill Shorten for fibre to the home that will never happen—his copper-plated guarantee of switching back to old technology and 'fraudband' as he called it. He now sees that the Liberals are doing it first, and we are doing it right. When you connect a home through fibre to the node you get speeds—we know from the trials that there are speeds between 25 megabits per second and 87 off peak, which are thoroughly adequate for the needs of today and tomorrow. They can be improved as required and when economically justifiable to do so. There is a very strong economic case for fibre to the node. I cannot help it that there are no economic degrees over on that side of the chamber. In reality, the sooner we get high-speed broadband to our suburbs the better, and only Malcolm Turnbull and the coalition are delivering it.