Two key pieces of legislation relating to the National Broadband Network have been approved by both houses of parliament in Canberra, after a week of prolonged debate and negotiation which Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull today described as a “spectacle”.
The bills – the National Broadband Network Companies Bill 2010 and the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (NBN Measures — Access Arrangements) Bill 2010 set out ownership, governance and sale arrangements for NBN Co, including a government commitment to eventually sell its stake in the company. In addition, they set out the access arrangements for NBN Co – including its mainly wholesale status.
In a statement released this afternoon, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy thanked Greens MP Adam Bandt and the independents with which his Labor Government had been forced to negotiate with to secure their support with the legislation, particularly on the issue of uniform national wholesale pricing for competitive access to NBN Co’s infrastructure.
“With the cooperation of the independents the Government sought to put a Resolution to the House of Representatives confirming our commitment to the principle of uniform wholesale national pricing,” Conroy said.
“With the agreement of independents Rob Oakshott, Tony Windsor, Andrew Wilkie, and Greens MP Adam Bandt, the Government has committed to prepare a Community Impact Statement on all future policy decisions on technology, speed and/or price, with a view to continue the application of uniform wholesale national pricing where possible,” he added.
Conroy last week published several pages of Labor amendments to the NBN legislation at the last minute, meaning Parliament was forced to sit on extra days to get the package of bills through.
In a statement released this afternoon, Turnbull claimed the Government had been engaged in delaying tactics on its own legislation – which he described as “quite a spectacle” – as it hadn’t agreed to a deal on amendments with certain independents.
“However, this should not be blamed on the shortfalls of minority Government but the utter incompetence of Senator Stephen Conroy,” Turnbull said. “To watch him making far-reaching amendments to win single votes on multi-billion dollar projects – which will be felt for many years to come – in the last minutes of debate in Parliament suggests he doesn’t properly respect the workings of this place.”
For his part, Conroy described it as “outrageous” that the Opposition should block consideration of the Government’s resolution on uniform wholesale national pricing. “The Opposition claim they support uniform wholesale national pricing, but they weren’t even willing to consider a Resolution promoting that important principle, when given the chance,” he said.
The passage of the legislation comes at a key time for Australia’s telecommunications industry. Over the next two days (the 28th and 29th of March), key figures such as the chief executives of Telstra, NBN Co, AAPT and Internode will speak at the Communications Day Summit in Sydney, in addition to political figures such as Turnbull.
Conroy is not speaking at the event this year, but it is likely that the passage of the NBN legislation – including several controversial amendments relating to the provision of services to non-telco organisations such as energy utilities – will be a key topic of conversation at the event.
Image credit: Kim Davies, Creative Commons
Strangely Bob Katter was the one who described the opposition best…
“Mr Katter blasted the opposition for not embracing a plan that will help deliver technological equality.
‘They think we should wait for some science fiction fantasy to jump out from behind a bush, (but) we’ve got an offer on the table, and we’re going to take it.’… {END}.
I was tuned into the live HoR feed yesterday and heard that pearler too. There’s nothing quite like a Katter rant when he goes into YELL AT EVERYONE mode. I think it was actually the first time I’ve ever completely agreed with what the nutter had to say!
I tend to agree with much that Katter says…it’s his delivery that’s hard to take sometimes…but he was certainly in fine form last night.
I think Bob Katter’s attitude is summed up by this excellent work of graphic art:
http://phetdreams.tumblr.com/post/1080393339/fuck-yeah
Actually Mr Turnball, incompetence would have been failure to pass the legislation.
Even if the legilsation is horrably flawed, Conroy’s main job is to pass the legislation and get royal assent on it. Which he has done. Thats #winning
Truly. And as many people have pointed out, Conroy doesn’t actually need the legislation to build the NBN — they have been building it for a year now.
Taking that one step further Darryl, perhaps old Mal is therefore trying to hide his incompetence of failing to stop the legislation?
It was always going to pass eventually.
The failure of the Coalition – (this is not just Malcolm) – was to not succeed with their amendments – whether they be good ones or bad ones, they were not able to sway the cross-benchers required to get them through.
+1
True indeed Michael, as it is also the government’s success, not Conroy’s own personal success, per se`.
But if Turnbull wants to single out his counterpart for criticism (and in my opinion undue, somewhat hypocritical criticism, seeing it was passed), surely Mal must then be willing to cop reciprocal, personal criticism?
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