Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Blue Mountains and Hawkesbury got a dud deal on the NBN—$57 billion left us with a mishmash of technology, most of it substandard. Finally there was the dangling from the government of the promise for a FTTN upgrade to fibre to the premises, if you are prepared to pay. The Liberals should have realised seven years ago we needed fibre. It's faster, more reliable and it would have been more economical to do it once and do it right. I've launched a petition calling for a prioritising of the villages from Lawson to Mount Victoria and places like Grose Vale and Kurrajong Hills, across to McGraths Hill to Freemans Reach and Wilberforce to be overbuilt with fibre as soon as possible.

Here is what people are telling me about their current experience. Carol, from Mt Victoria, says: 'Our internet speeds are ridiculously slow. We need fibre to the premises, not to the node up the road.' From Blackheath, Jack says, 'The internet has been unusable here for some time now with so many people working from home.' Julie says she goes days without the internet, and the technician admits it's all on the NBN side. Patricia from Wentworth Falls says her FTTN constantly drops out. How can anyone work? That is echoed by Karen in Wenty; she gets dropouts three times a day. Bernard in North Leura says it is constantly unreliable. Christine from Lawson says her fibre to the node is terrible—700 metres from the node and above-ground copper between. We need a fair deal for the mountains and Hawkesbury. (Time expired)