Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for the Murray Darling Basin) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Conroy. I refer the minister to the plan by BT to build a ₤2.5 billion optical fibre network to reach 17 million UK premises, which has prompted comments in the Financial Times that:

It is not yet clear how the economics will stack up … some worry the build will be more expensive than expected while others fret about demand. Investors should be in no doubt that this is a gamble.

If a ₤2.5 billion network in a densely populated country is ‘a gamble’, how is a $43 billion investment in Australia not an even bigger gamble?