Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

Mark my words, Minister, that is where you are going to end up. Your fibre-to-the home proposal gave you a lot of excitement: it gave you tingles up the spine. But as Mr Turnbull mentioned at the first meeting of the new joint committee this morning, he has just been to Korea and Singapore. They do not have fibre to the home there. They have fibre to the node. Even in these brand new, high-rise buildings there is fibre to the node and they send it out from there. You can dismiss that. It is only Singapore; it is only South Korea—two of the quickest and most technologically advanced communication nations in the world. They are already doing that. Hopefully, you will be able to have a look at Mr Turnbull’s video. He has offered to make it available to the committee. I am sure he would make it available to your department, because I think you might find it a bit instructive. This is what happens when you make these policies on the run. They sound good and, for a little while, you can talk a language that nobody else can talk and you can get away anything.