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

I thank Senator Brandis for his ungracious question. NBN Co. has finalised its three-year corporate plan and its 30-year business plan. The company submitted the plan to the government on 8 November 2010. The government is committed to releasing as much information as possible from the business case and released a summary of the business case on 24 November 2010.

As the Prime Minister said yesterday, the summary was released to facilitate the passing of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer Safeguards) Bill 2010, which facilitates the structural separation of Telstra. Following a series of detailed discussions with the Independent senators, the government determined that it was possible to publicly release this material from NBN Co.’s business case in order to answer some of their key questions. The government has been very careful to ensure that the released material does not cause any market uncertainty and that the material does not relate to matters which are under cabinet consideration. As the Prime Minister has made clear, NBN Co.’s business plan will be released in December. The business case summary includes material on capital and operational expenditure, government equity investments, products to be released to consumers, the basis for the pricing of NBN Co.’s products and NBN Co.’s risk management. The summary expands on the information in the letter we received from NBN Co. on 19 November. It confirms that the NBN will be built on a financially viable basis with affordable prices for consumers. (Time expired)