Carol Brown (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to Senator Coonan, the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts. I refer the minister to the recently released OECD broadband statistics to June 2006. Can the minister confirm that, despite her claims about the pace of broadband growth, Australia remains ranked 17th out of 30 surveyed countries for the take-up of broadband? Can the minister also confirm that Australia’s feeble international ranking in these statistics did not improve at all in the past year? Why is Australia continuing to trail its international peers in the use of this important economic infrastructure? Why has the government failed to ensure that Australian business has access to the infrastructure it needs to remain internationally competitive?

Helen Coonan (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Carol Brown for the question. The first comment I would make is that she should not get Senator Conroy to write questions, because he does not always get it right. I have seen the latest OECD broadband figures which show that, in comparison to other OECD countries, Australians are embracing broadband at an extraordinary rate. We are now fast approaching four million subscribers connected to broadband in Australia, with an estimated 3,518,000 broadband services in Australia as of June this year. The most recent OECD report highlights that the countries with the strongest per capita subscriber growth come not from the United States or the UK but from Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Finland, Sweden and Australia. Each of these countries added more than six subscribers per 100 inhabitants during the past year alone. The number of broadband subscribers in Australia is now well above the OECD average.

There can be absolutely no argument that broadband infrastructure is critical to Australia’s future prosperity and, of course, it must be a national priority. It is why the government’s broadband policy, as Senator Carol Brown would understand, involves the best mix of private sector broadband rollout in commercial areas and targeted government assistance for areas of market failure. Just this morning, for Senator Brown’s information, I attended a technology demonstration of Telstra’s Next G mobile network. According to Telstra, this network will provide high-speed coverage to an estimated 98 per cent of the Australian population. Where it is not economic for the private sector to invest, of course, the government is providing targeted subsidies to ensure that all Australians have fair access to broadband. We are investing billions of dollars—$3.1 billion, in fact—to stimulate sustainable broadband infrastructure development and to eliminate mobile phone coverage black spots via the Connect Australia package.

Perhaps one of the most surprising omissions in all the recent media coverage on T3 and broadband is this new $3.1 billion Connect Australia package, which is the single largest government investment in telecommunications in Australian history. That certainly does not sound to me to be a government not aware of the importance of broadband and not committed to ensuring that broadband is available right across Australia, irrespective of where you live, but rather a government absolutely committed to getting the very best mix of technologies to provide the very best coverage, despite Australia’s vast landmass and some of the challenges of scattered populations. Our policy includes an $878 million Broadband Connect program—a true nation-building investment in new broadband infrastructure—and the $2 billion Communications Fund to deliver an income stream to fund upgrades into the future for rural telecommunication infrastructure.

In stark contrast to this and in stark contrast to the Labor Party, the government has a very clear national vision for broadband—one that makes the investment, does the work, does the heavy lifting and understands where telecommunications policy needs to go and not one where you put all your eggs in one basket, rely on one telecommunication provider, one technology, and sell Australia short. (Time expired)

Carol Brown (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Can the minister confirm that she became the minister for communications on 18 July 2004? I ask again: can the minister confirm that, according to the OECD, Australia’s international ranking for the use of broadband has not improved from 17th in the developed world since that time? Can the minister explain why Australia’s international ranking in the use of broadband has failed to improve while she has been minister for communications?

Helen Coonan (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would have thought that, from my primary answer, Senator Brown would have managed to get the point that this government’s commitment to broadband has in fact meant that there has been an exponential take-up of broadband, together with targeted government investment that is ensuring that multimegabit capacity is going to be available to Australians irrespective of where they live. It is very difficult to explain to Senator Brown that the Labor Party’s policy in this regard is totally unachievable, totally raids the Communications Fund and has no vision at all for the future of telecommunications.