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

I am delighted to inform the Senate today that, two weeks ago, the North West Star in Mount Isa ran a report calling for rural and remote communities to have the same access to medical and telecommunications services as their city and coastal counterparts. This push was made by none other than the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Abbott, who said:

… Mount Isa should have access to fibre optic cable as soon as possible …

"It would significantly improve broadband and mobile phone coverage in the region," he said.

"It's the sort of thing we could get cracking on straight away."

I am happy to advise that, under the Gillard government's NBN rollout, Mount Isa, with a population of more than 22,000 people, will receive fibre to the premises under our world-class NBN, whilst under the coalition's own policies even large regional centres like Mount Isa would miss out on fibre altogether. (Time expired)