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

As Senator Macdonald rightly points out, not to mention a cost-benefit analysis as well. Indeed, we would hope that the Productivity Commission inquiry would undertake a thorough and rigorous cost-benefit analysis into the building of this NBN. There are amendments that I will come to later to once again try to encourage that. But we do note the strange hypocrisy whereby the government and the Greens think it is reasonable to come into this process of debating these bills and say that in relation to terminating the NBN as a Commonwealth entity, in relation to privatising it, there is a good case at that point to have a Productivity Commission inquiry. Yet the government—and the Greens, whenever they have been given the opportunity to vote on this matter—have consistently argued that there not be a Productivity Commission inquiry into actually spending billions upon billions of taxpayer dollars building this thing. That is the question. It is very strange that the government would want to have a Productivity Commission inquiry at one end of this process but not have one at the other end.

We think that future governments—future parliaments—will of course set the terms on which NBN Co. may ultimately be sold. That is not an unreasonable thing. That is what we would expect to ultimately happen in the many, many years ahead, potentially, if indeed we were to wait until this thing were complete. But there is no reason to leave these provisions, proscriptive as they are, in place—no reason at all, aside from the government’s desire to have a deal that stands in place with the Greens. This is a government desperately conceding a few points that will hamper future governments so that it can get its way today with the Greens. It is not acceptable, and that is why we seek to remove these various provisions and provide the amendments I have moved.