Justine Elliot (Richmond, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in continuation on this very, very important bill, the National Broadband Network Companies Amendment (Commitment to Public Ownership) Bill 2024. I am pleased to be speaking in continuation further on this particular bill, as the Albanese government is committed to keeping the NBN in public ownership. We've made that very clear. We want to keep it in public ownership, because we believe the NBN needs to stay in full government ownership to support the ongoing upgrade of the network, which is absolutely vital, and to ensure ongoing regulatory oversight of NBN wholesale pricing, keeping broadband affordable for Australians, particularly as those upgrades continue in regional and rural areas I spoke about in my initial contribution.

The need to have constant upgrades of the NBN and connectivity is absolutely vital for our regional communities. In a community like mine, there are so many reasons why it's absolutely vital. We have a huge number of small businesses in my area of northern New South Wales. They're the backbone of our local economy. Those businesses need to be connected. People need to have access to NBN and connectivity for many work purposes. Of course, it needs to be in place for a whole range of educational purposes, and people need to have that access and connectivity there for many personal needs too.

Even more so, in areas like mine and other areas that are prone to natural disasters, we need to have access to communication services, and we need to know that we're able to access those services. Certainly, in our devastating floods of 2022, which I've spoken about here many times, one of the big issues was the lack of connectivity and communication. We need to ensure that we have as many services as possible in place to assist our communities—for all of those everyday reasons that people need in communities and, even more so, in regional areas.

The government has been making an ongoing investment in the NBN to bring the benefits of high-speed broadband to many more Australians. This government support includes a commitment of $2.4 billion to replace the deteriorating copper network with fibre, which will provide 90 per cent of Australians—around 10 million premises—in the NBN fixed line footprint with access to faster and more reliable broadband. We have been rolling that out in so many communities. This investment is already delivering benefits, with increased reliability, fewer faults and access to higher speeds. In addition, the government and NBN Co are delivering a $750 million investment to upgrade services in the NBN fixed wireless network, which has flow-on benefits to NBN satellite services, which are, of course, very vital as well in many regional and rural areas.

I mentioned before the need to have these services in times of natural disasters—in my area, particularly with those devastating floods. We have a whole series of measures that help communities like mine. One of those is the STAND program, the Strengthening Telecommunications Against Natural Disasters program. We've had installations right across the country. In my area we've had installations at the Tweed Shire Council civic centre auditorium and also at the Mullumbimby Rural Fire Service brigade. It's important to have those STAND programs in place so that there can be a backup of NBN Sky Muster satellite services under that program and under other programs that we're rolling out. As I said, when we had our flood in 2022 there were absolutely no communications available at all, so the increase in that emergency backup satellite access is so important for our area and any other areas that are, unfortunately, subject to those natural disasters. There are many throughout the nation, so increasing our investment in STAND and other programs helps those communities become more resilient, which is all part of the resilience programs and the mitigation measures that we need to have in place to assist our communities.

The increase in towers that we see, particularly in regional areas, is vital too. We've had many in the north coast of New South Wales recently, and I have supported each and every one of those for all the reasons I outlined, as well as the need for emergency services and for residents to have access not only in natural disasters but in their everyday lives. For example, thankfully, there is a tower underway at Newrybar, which will be providing a whole lot of increased connectivity to many areas, particularly Bangalow, which has had horrific access to the NBN. Having that tower is the only way to ensure that those people can get, and stay, connected. I have 100 per cent supported that.

Many years ago, in my area, unfortunately, there was some very criminal activity which damaged one of the towers. I spoke out at the time and absolutely condemned that. We need to have these towers in place in our regional areas, and I've supported all of those that are coming online in my community. Some of those, of course, do receive government funding, particularly through our Peri-Urban Mobile Program. We announced one just a couple of weeks ago, with funding for new mobile phone infrastructure for the Optus network in the Kingscliff area, another area that has had many issues in terms of connectivity. I've only mentioned two of the towers, but there are others—and we need to have them in place because it is obviously a lot more difficult in those regional areas in terms of being able to access all sorts of communications services. So I will continue to encourage all forms of communication that assist regional communities.

Through this bill the National Broadband Network Companies Act will be amended to remove conditions enabling a future government to privatise NBN Co. These changes reinforce in legislation our government's commitment. It is absolutely resolute. The bill provides certainty to everyone—to stakeholders—including so many broadband consumers, the wider telecommunications industry, broadband retailers and NBN Co, that the Commonwealth will continue to retain ownership of NBN Co. Very importantly, it provides certainty to all consumers, particularly those consumers in regional and rural Australia who are so dependent on their communications access. This certainty supports the government's commitment for NBN Co to provide high-speed and reliable broadband connectivity for all Australians. That is our commitment and that is why NBN Co must remain in public ownership.

I commend the bill to the House.

Cameron Caldwell (Fadden, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to speak against this bill, the National Broadband Network Companies Amendment (Commitment to Public Ownership) Bill 2024, and in doing so I think it is worth reflecting briefly on the history of where this came from. We'll recall that a few weeks ago the Prime Minister in question time had a particularly bad afternoon. He popped into the chamber late that night, issued an apology to the people of Australia, and then promptly, the next day, absolutely out of nowhere, we found this new piece of bright, shiny legislation which is nothing more—and was nothing more at the time—than a complete distraction, a shiny bauble so that people stopped thinking about either the Prime Minister's actions or what was actually going on in their life at the time. What we ended up with is six pieces of paper that form this unbelievably unimportant piece of legislation.

I'll refer, for example, to some legislation that was introduced earlier today, just to give those viewing at home a little bit of a sense of what six pages might achieve. Earlier today we saw some legislation introduced that was 227 pages long—substantial reform. So what on earth might we or the government be trying to achieve with these six pages? I can tell you what they're trying to achieve: really, not much more than the complete distraction and smokescreen that I referred to. It doesn't do more than a front page headline for them to use, which is: National Broadband Network Companies Amendment (Commitment to Public Ownership). There we have it, ladies and gentlemen. That's your headline. That's the distraction. What it shows is the level of desperation that this government have two weeks out from the end of the year, when there are two more sitting weeks. They are completely out of ideas on issues that are genuinely important to Australians.

I can tell you that this issue about the public ownership of the NBN is almost the furthest thing from the minds of the average Australian at the moment. I get around the electorate. I talk to people. I stand outside a supermarket or walk through the park. I can tell you that none of them are coming up to me, saying, 'Geez, I really think that we should change that piece of legislation about the potential future sale of the NBN because I'm really worried about that.' No. What they're saying is: 'I'm really worried about my grocery bill. I'm really worried about my electricity bill.' And what are we seeing from this Labor government? We're seeing not much on those issues. In fact, we know that this is really just a sneaky distraction because not even the government itself has been talking about the NBN. The Prime Minister himself last mentioned this on 3 July, and it's only been mentioned a few times in parliament this whole year.

I'll give credit to people where it's due, but I'm just thinking that there's something quite cynical about this whole thing. Part of it is in what we saw from the member for Richmond, who is one of the better performing local members out of a very bad government—I'll give her that—maybe using this time in the public domain that's streamed out to lounge rooms cross Australia and watched frivolously on various social media channels to talk about how amazing the coverage is in suburbs like Kingscliff and Newrybar. That's all fantastic, but that's not actually what this bill is about. This bill is a bill to try and amend some provisions of legislation that was brought in almost 14 years ago to the day.

The irony of this is that the distraction tactic chosen by the PM has given us as an opposition some time now to really delve into the history of the NBN. What I love more than anything in life is a dose of irony. The biggest dose of irony that I think we've found in our subsequent research is that, at a time when we all know the Prime Minister was famously the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport—and I understand he was very concerned about how aeroplanes were getting around at that time—he momentarily showed an interest in the NBN, almost 14 years ago to the day, in his second reading speech to this place on Thursday 25 November 2010. So the Prime Minister himself actually tabled the legislation, about which he says in his speech:

It also sets out arrangements for the eventual sale of the Commonwealth's stake in the company once the NBN rollout is complete, including provisions for independent and parliamentary reviews prior to any privatisation, and for the parliament to have the final say on the sale.

I'm just finding it quite curious that, 14 years later, the Prime Minister now feels it's time to go back on what he thought was a pretty good idea then, by amending these provisions with the seven pages of flimsy legislation that have been put forward. It would seem to support the fact that the whole basis of this is really nothing more than a splash of a headline. Perhaps it's a distraction, but I think it's probably something more.

We know from this period of time, if we go back to 2010, that another Labor luminary who was right in on this NBN action at the time, Senator Stephen Conroy, was going ballistic in the media, with press release after press release. The press release that was issued on 22 November 2010 has the heading 'Government committed to sale of NBN Co'. Again, I'm finding it extraordinary that the very people who are now trying to save the NBN from some fanciful sale offering are actually the ones that created the vehicle and the idea for the whole thing in the first place. Senator Conroy was very clear in what he was expecting at the time, and the Prime Minister—the then Minister for Infrastructure and Transport—was very clear when he gave his second reading speech. The press release says:

Senator Conroy said the Gillard Government remained firmly committed to selling its stake in NBN Co after the network was fully built and operational, subject to market conditions and security considerations.

He said:

The Government has always said any sale of NBN Co will be subject to a Productivity Commission inquiry before any sale takes place.

They clearly thought about this a lot because there's an entire process that's set up with what we might describe in the modern vernacular as guardrails so that this thing would go really well and maximise the public interest and the financial outcome.

It just seems extraordinary, again, that I reflect that in 2024, almost 14 years to the day after this press release, I'm standing in this same place now with this Labor government undoing the very thing that it set out to achieve. I find some of this really quite interesting, in that there were some very clear steps set out as to how any potential sale could take place. I'm going to step through those because this is not something where a third party could just run out into the world, stick it on the internet with a 'for sale' sign and sell it to the highest bidder. It's not like that. The legislation is very clear, and perhaps, to give them some credit, they thought this through. It provides about five simple steps that would need to be attended to before any sale could be completed.

Firstly, the NBN has to be complete. We know that that's the case. It was declared by the minister at the time that the NBN, for this purpose, was complete. But then steps 2, 3, 4 and 5 are, in my understanding, nowhere near happening. The first one of these incomplete steps is that the Productivity Commission would need to be requested to conduct a 12-month inquiry. The next step would be that we would then have a parliamentary joint committee to consider the Productivity Commission's 12-month inquiry report. It would then need to be declared ready for sale, and, ultimately, there would need to be a decision of both houses of the parliament for this to go ahead.

This framework has been in place, as I said, for 14 years. The framework has been the same for 14 years. Nothing's changed since the Prime Minister first walked in here in November 2010 and introduced this legislation. There has been absolutely no mention of this from the coalition. There's been no suggestion of a sale. There's been no suggestion of a change in the approach to the sale. What we've been doing as a coalition is remaining firmly focused on the things that matter to Australians, and this stunt, quite frankly, is not one of those things. Perhaps it's the ghosts of Labor governments past that they're trying to save this sale from—that somehow the then Prime Minister concocted some sort of landmine that the Prime Minister's now going to step on 14 years later.

This is all complete and utter nonsense. I think what's more likely—from having seen the Labor Party in operation over many years—is we're going to see a corflute campaign at the next election. Make no mistake, there is nothing that Labor love better than a policy that they can fit onto a corflute. I'm wondering what these corflutes are going to say. Maybe one of them will say 'Keep the NBN in public hands'. Maybe another will say 'Cheaper internet'.

Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! No loud giggling, please!

Cameron Caldwell (Fadden, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I love the enthusiasm shown by the member for Lingiari, because her engagement on this issue would actually suggest to me that, having recently seen the successful election of the CLP in the Northern Territory, where the Labor government utterly failed on a number of fronts, she knows exactly what I mean about how the Labor Party will run the next federal campaign. It will all fit on either a postage stamp or the back of a coaster, but, more likely, it will fit on a corflute. This Labor government thinks it can create some kind of distraction, and the Prime Minister thought he could distract Australians away from their troubles. But now it's grown into something else. As I said, the member for Richmond is talking about how great the tower coverage is, and that gives them a reason to talk about it. That's fantastic. But it's a distraction from the issues that are important to Australians. The government think that by creating a shiny bauble over here about the public ownership of the NBN, when they're having an entire Seinfeld episode of their own about whether it can or can't be sold or will or won't be sold, Australians are not going to focus on the government's failures when they're casting their ballot at the next election. Unfortunately for this Labor government, it severely underestimates what Australians know is going on in their household budgets.

This NBN sham of a bill is actually the last thing that Australians are thinking about right now. They want relief from their hip pocket; they want relief from cost-of-living pressures. They want to see their mortgage payments going down. None of those things are done by a government who is too busy chasing the corflute headline.

Carina Garland (Chisholm, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

By his own admission, the previous speaker spoke for 15 minutes about nothing, and I tend to agree with him. I'll just make a couple of observations here, on the National Broadband Network Companies Amendment (Commitment to Public Ownership) Bill. The first is that this bill cannot be an unimportant piece of legislation or just a distraction—they say we shouldn't be interested in it—when it is already so significant that the opposition have made the decision to vote against safeguarding the NBN. It's really up to those opposite to explain what their position is and why they don't want to safeguard the NBN. It is also up to those opposite to explain why, for the issues they profess to care about, such as reducing the cost of living, they are so determined to vote against measures like fee-free TAFE or housing legislation or debt relief for students. I am experiencing a bit of confusion right now, I'll be honest, given the contribution of the previous speaker. It would be really valuable to understand if they think this bill is so unimportant that they are going to dismiss it or if it is so important that they are determined to oppose it and vote against it.

I invite those opposite to work with us to safeguard the NBN and to commit to the cost-of-living relief measures that our government has sensibly put forward. It is really important to show bipartisan support for cost-of-living relief. People and communities across Australia would love to see that. That invitation is an open one to those opposite to support our sensible measures.

The reason this is such an important bill to have before the House is that we know Labor is the party that had the vision to put the NBN forward and to implement a national broadband network for this country. That network would mean that people in our communities could be connected and would have world-class internet access. Unfortunately, we saw that undermined and compromised when the coalition came to power in 2013. That is why we want to make sure that, while we are in government, we take the opportunity to safeguard the very important national asset that is the National Broadband Network.

Unfortunately, we've seen too often the tendency of those opposite to cut and gut public assets. I'm from Victoria, where we still have a long memory of the legacy of Jeff Kennett and what his state government did to our state. Schools closed, and we are now having to reopen public schools right across the state as a result of the fact that they did not respect and did not treat with due regard the public sector and public assets like schools, like hospitals and like so many other important public services. We know, unfortunately, that it does seem to be in the DNA of those opposite to cut public services and to privatise the assets and utilities that are probably best served by being in public hands. That's why we're putting forward this bill today—to amend the National Broadband Network Companies Act 2011 to ensure ongoing public ownership of the NBN. This bill is going to make it really clear to Australian people that we have a deep, deep commitment to the ongoing sustainability and efficiency of the NBN and we want to keep it in public hands. We've supported strong regulatory oversight already, and we've already settled a special access undertaking with the ACCC to cap wholesale prices. We're really worried about what those opposite might do if they ever—and I'm worried about this—got access to this side of the House and sat on these benches because we know that not only do they like to reduce services and cut costs in ways that have detrimental effects on our communities but they also like to sell off public assets.

We are absolutely committed to keeping the NBN in public hands. We are incorporating new wording into the existing act to make clear that the preservation of the NBN in public ownership is an explicit requirement, removing provisions in the act relating to the NBN Co sale scheme. We strongly believe that the NBN needs to stay in full government ownership to support the ongoing upgrade of the network and ensure ongoing regulatory oversight of NBN wholesale pricing, keeping broadband affordable for all Australians. We know how important the NBN is for connectivity. I think most of us could not imagine our lives without being online and being able to have easy and affordable access to the internet. It is vital for all parts of our lives, whether it be work, whether it be education, whether it be leisure or whether it be keeping in contact with loved ones. So we know that we need to be a responsible government and safeguard and protect this important public asset. We made our commitment clear in the updated statement of expectations in 2022 that the NBN needs to stay in government hands.

Government ownership is essential to deliver the strategy for a more connected Australia, including rolling out more fibre in the fixed line network, planning for the transition to next-generation satellites and modernising universal service obligations. I think the other thing that's really important to understand and remember here is that the internet and the NBN are evolving all the time as technology evolves, and so it will be best delivered through government where we're able to have that flexibility and those obligations for services to our communities to upgrade the system appropriately. This is crucial national infrastructure with cybersecurity and national security imperatives too, which absolutely—and I'd hope that both sides of the House can agree on this—require strong government oversight to ensure that we protect national and cybersecurity requirements. This is best delivered through ongoing government ownership. Any future sale of the NBN would likely involve foreign ownership, which raises potentially serious national sovereignty and security risks, and I'd urge those opposite to be mindful of those.

The former coalition government had taken the initial legislative steps to prepare the NBN for sale, which is quite worrying, especially in the context of what I've just described in relation to national security, including declaring the network built and fully operational in 2020. The coalition also supported an NBN submission to increase wholesale prices on their core product by three per cent and to bolster their income streams in preparation for sale. This was ultimately rejected by Labor and rejected by the ACCC. I mentioned earlier the memory of some of us—and my memories in Victoria—in terms of coalition governments selling off public assets. Of course, who can forget the sale of Telstra under the Howard government? This is a prime example of the coalition making promises on prices and services for telecommunications that were not delivered. The sale of Telstra also deprived the government of leverage to roll out fibre broadband in Australia, necessitating the Rudd government's establishment of the NBN in the first place.

Our government has been consulting on regional telecommunications services and has received feedback from communities, particularly in rural and regional Australia, that there is strong support for the NBN network to stay in government ownership. We know that keeping the NBN in public ownership is absolutely essential to continue to provide modern, accessible and affordable communication services for all Australians, no matter where they live.

I would hope that those opposite can recognise the importance of giving the public assurances about the future of the NBN. I hope that those opposite can recognise the importance in relation to cybersecurity and national security of ensuring the NBN remains in government hands. I'm really pleased to commend the bill to the House.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yet another political stunt by this desperate Albanese Labor government. As usual, there is absolutely no real consideration of the issues which are having such an impact on regional Australians. I know Labor neither understands nor, worse, cares about those Australians who live over the sandstone curtain, the Great Dividing Range. How about this government do something different for a change. How about this government focus on improving regional phone connectivity. They'll say, 'But we are.' But when they brought out their election promise of the so-called improving connectivity round—and it was an election promise—all the upgrades to the existing mobile phone towers went to Labor Party seats. They came in here and they said: 'We will have transparency and integrity. There will be no pork-barrelling under us.' Well, shame on them because the colour-coded spreadsheets—at least ours had a bit of colour, but theirs were all red when it came to upgrading mobile phone towers.

Residents are rightly concerned. Just two months ago I spoke both locally back in my Riverina electorate and in this place about the issue of mobile connectivity affecting residents in and around Ardlethan and Kamarah. They're not big towns but they're very important agricultural entities and districts. Ardlethan had a tin mine which flourished for many years until the world price of that commodity dropped through the floor. They were big wheat growing areas and sheep producing areas. Residents there shouldn't have to climb the nearest wheat silo to get coverage, to get reception, to get at least one bar on their mobile phone, particularly during harvest and particularly if there's a medical emergency. That is just not right.

Farmers these days expect better, farmers demand better and farmers deserve better. Particularly since we had the deregulation of the wheat industry, farmers need their mobiles whilst they're up the paddock, whilst they're on the chaser bins, whilst they're on the header and whilst they're stripping their crops to be able to sell those crops, that grain. Once upon a time you took it to the silo and the wheat board took care of it, and you got the price depending on the hard wheat or whatever quality and quantity you produced. Not these days—you can actually sell the wheat; there's a huge market for it. But you can't sell it if you can't get mobile coverage. Farmers tend to sometimes lose tens of thousands of dollars simply because they can't get the right price at the right time because they've got no damn coverage. It's just not good enough.

This government comes in here with legislation that is not going to fix the farmers left in the Kamarah district. I know that Telstra is working closely with the farmers and I appreciate the efforts to which the southern regional manager, Chris Taylor, is going to help them. I know there's been a delay in that, and I know that Telstra and Mr Taylor have been upfront with the residents. But it's incumbent upon this government to show a little bit of care and concern over those issues affecting those regional people.

I know the benefits of bringing mobile phone connectivity—and I appreciate this is about broadband, but it's all about data and having connections to the rest of the world—and how much the benefits bring to areas. I remember unveiling a tower in Goobarragandra, in what was then the Tumut snowy valleys, and I know how pleased Tony Keremelevski was. He said that will actually save lives and he fought so hard for the benefits it brought to a little place called Murringo in the Young district of the Hilltops Council area. The number of small businesses run by women in that area who were going to be connected to the world because of the connection that we provided through the mobile phone tower at Murringo—

Debate interrupted.