Alex Gallacher (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Conroy. Can the minister advise the Senate why the government is building the National Broadband Network to deliver at least 100 megabits per second on the fibre-to-the-home network? Is the minister aware of any alternative proposals?

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

I thank the senator for his question. The Gillard government is committed to building the NBN to meet Australia's current and future broadband needs. Those opposite have no similar commitment. The member for Wentworth continually denies there is a need for speeds above 25 megabits a second—he is continually in denial. Let me give you just one description of a typical family by an executive of a European technology company that disagrees with Mr Turnbull. The executive said:

Between 8 and 10pm, the mother is watching a 3D movie, which uses about 30Mbps; the father is doing two things at once: uploading his weekly work at 5Mbps upstream, and watching the World Cup on HD IPTV, which consumes about 15Mbps. The daughter is streaming her university courses from her university website at about 10Mbps, while the other 2 kids are playing a streaming game that uses 5Mbps and uploading a video of their last football match to Facebook, again at 5Mbps upstream. Combining these gives a total download of 60Mbps and 10Mbps upload - that still leaves 40Mbps for other new usages.

So who is this technology executive, Mr President—I hear you ask? It is of course Jean-Claude Bourgoint, the Director of Fixed Access Networks and Services at French Telecom. Mr Bourgoint is explaining why the bandwidth of fibre to the home is essential. There are so many uses for broadband households. They will not do only one thing at a time, as Mr Turnbull is trying to tell them they can only do. Mr Bourgoint went on to say:

Whilst I have not yet seen— (Time expired)

Alex Gallacher (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Can the minister provide other examples of telecommunications executives explaining the benefit of fibre to the home over other technologies, including hybrid fibre coax?

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

I told the Senate yesterday of the plans of Telefonica to provide fibre to the home to 1.3 million premises in Madrid. In making the announcement, this is what the Telefonica executives had to say:

Compared to other solutions combined with hybrid fiber coaxial cable, optical fiber deployment to the home offers the best performance, not just download speeds, but upload to the network, facilitating and making more flexible management of all services, applications and content that is in the cloud.

Telefonica, just like Telecom France, know that fibre to the home provides the best solution to our future broadband needs. Those opposite should stop listening to Mr Turnbull but start listening to the companies he invests in.

Alex Gallacher (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a further supplementary question. Can fibre to the node provide a cost-effective pathway to fibre to the home?

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

(—) (): The member for Wentworth, despite his own personal investment habits, continues to insist that Australia does not need fibre to the home. He claims we can make do with fibre to the node for the rest and extend to the home some time in the future. Last September, Xavier Pichon, the Chief Financial Officer of France Telecom, told an investment conference that FTTC CAPEX are not reusable as part of an FTTP deployment. Mr Turnbull's plan will waste capital expenditure by delaying the inevitable. The member for Wentworth has called for an end to spin, exaggeration and misstatements in political discourse. He should start by telling the truth— (Time expired)