Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I appreciate that, while you have been able to convince yourselves, certainly, that this is a bill that revolves around the National Broadband Network, it is a bill that you have been opposed to for over 12 months. First of all, you demanded to see the expert panel’s advice. You said, ‘We can’t deal with this bill until after that is made available,’ so we gave you what was available. Then you said, ‘We want to see the ACCC’s advice to the expert panel,’ and, when we tabled that, did that make a difference? No, you kept opposing it. Then you said you wanted a cost-benefit analysis. Then you said that you wanted this piece of information and that piece of information. The truth is that you have been opposed to this all along, even though, as I said earlier, many of you—perhaps even Senator Brandis—also believe in the structural separation of Telstra.