Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Conroy. Is it not the case that Australian families will have to pay between $897 million and $1.4 billion every year to access high-speed broadband services under Labor’s broadband network?

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

I am not sure what figures those calculations are based on at all. I have not heard them before and they certainly have not been touted around publicly. So I would have to say to you that the pricing of the national broadband network is a critical part of the negotiations going on in the request for proposals at the moment. I am sure that every member opposite would understand that I have no intention of speculating on what the pricing should be. But if you, in your supplementary question, would like to explain the basis of those calculations, I am sure the chamber would be enlightened.

Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. I note the minister’s answer. Has the government done any modelling on this at all? If not, is this not just another example of Labor making policy without any of the necessary evidence?

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

As I said, if you could enlighten the chamber as to the basis of those figures, they would perhaps mean something. I repeat: we are in the middle of a live negotiation to deliver both the structure and the cost of the national broadband network, which goes to the issue of the wholesale price. They are the key issues.

Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

So you do not know how much they have to pay.

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

I am sure that even you have not revealed your negotiating position before you started negotiations with any of your colleagues.

Alan Ferguson (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Conroy, please address your remarks through the chair.

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

My apologies. I accept your admonishments. As I was saying, I am sure that the good senator opposite would not sit down in a negotiation with any of his friends or colleagues in the Western Australian Liberal Party and say, ‘Here’s my bottom line; let’s start the negotiations.’ I am sure that even he would not do that. The Rudd government has no intention of revealing its views on a range of these issues prior to the conclusion of the negotiations. (Time expired)