news Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has accused his Opposition counterpart of intentionally spreading “hysterical claims” in comments made this week with respect to budget treatment of National Broadband Network funding, in the latest spat between the two over the high-profile infrastructure project.
In a statement issued this morning, Turnbull claimed that “well over a million premises” would not receive the NBN infrastructure on the dates promised in what he said was NBN Co’s “increasingly discredited” corporate plan delivered in 2012, basing the claim on figures pulled from Federal Budget papers published last night.
“The Budget reveals Labor has cut its planned equity investment in the NBN between this financial year and 2014-15 by $3.5 billion, or 20 per cent,” said Turnbull. “The gutting of the NBN’s funding is a clear admission it is disastrously behind the schedule unveiled by Stephen Conroy and Julia Gillard only nine months ago, in August 2012.”
“On 19 April, CEO Michael Quigley told a Parliamentary committee NBN Co was running fibre past established homes and businesses at a cost of about $2300 per premise. If Mr Quigley’s figure is accurate, the huge reduction in investment means 1.5 million premises scheduled to receive the NBN by June 2016 will not have it by this date. The Government must come clean today on which Australians expecting the NBN will miss out.”
“Julia Gillard must level with the Australian people, and provide an open and honest account of who will be affected by NBN Co’s latest massive fail – a colossal shortfall in its construction rollout now recognised by the Budget cutbacks. Last night’s figures confirm precisely what the Coalition has said for the past four years: The Labor NBN is unaffordable within the currently claimed budget and undeliverable on the currently claimed schedule.”
However, Conroy immediately fired back, stating that the Liberal MP’s “hysterical claims” were false and highlighted his incompetence. “Mr Turnbull’s latest effort suggests that a reduction in equity provided to NBN Co in the Budget somehow means people will miss out on Labor’s NBN,” Conroy said.
“The facts are NBN Co’s equity is appropriated each year and then drawn down as required. In the current financial year, equity requirements were less than anticipated, reflecting the reforecast rollout schedule.” In March this year, NBN Co revealed that it was three months behind its current rollout schedule.
“The Budget reconfirms the total government equity contributions to NBN Co will be up to $30.4 billion,” Conroy added. “This compares with the $29.5 billion that Malcolm Turnbull intends to borrow to build an inadequate network that will be obsolete by the time it is built.”
“Mr Turnbull also claims that the equity provided to NBN Co is only for rolling out fibre to established homes and businesses. Mr Turnbull is either incompetent or being deliberately misleading. Labor’s NBN is being rolled out to all Australians – in greenfields and brownfields, via fibre, fixed wireless and satellite technologies.”
Conroy said the Coalition’s rival NBN policy had been “dismissed as a lemon”, and the Member for Wentworth was now grasping at anything he could to try to discredit Labor’s NBN policy.
“The only way Australians will miss out on the NBN is if the Coalition wins the next election and disconnects 9 million households from getting fibre to the home for free.,” said Conroy. “Mr Turnbull’s claim can be added to a litany of lies that the Coalition has told to hide the fact that they are planning to build the broadband equivalent of a Sydney Harbour Bridge with only one lane. “Lies such as the NBN costs $90 billion; lies like the NBN should be on-Budget; and lies like Malcolm Turnbull can build his inadequate network for a third of the cost of Labor’s.”
Conroy is correct in that a number of senior Coalition members have made inaccurate statements about the NBN over the past several years. However, a number of senior Labor figures have also made inaccurate statements regarding the Coalition’s own NBN policy since it was released in mid-April, including Prime Minister Julia Gillard.
opinion/analysis
So who’s right here? Personally, I rather believe Conroy on this one. There is simply no demonstratable causal link between shifting NBN funds around in the budget and further delays to the project’s rollout schedule. Of course the NBN is already delayed, but for Turnbull to use budget statements to imply further delays — without any form of documentary evidence — is flatly ridiculous. It appears as though Turnbull is merely extrapolating a link which isn’t obviously there, and over-simplifying the NBN funding and rollout situation.
Budget statements from the Opposition are, every year (whether that year the Opposition is Labor or Coalition), often prepared at haste to get into the media cycle dominated by the Government of the day’s budget media frenzy. It appears as though Turnbull has let his standards slip and gotten himself into an unsustainable situation with this one.
It’s a pity — I was just starting to take the Earl of Wentworth’s media releases seriously again. I wasn’t even going to bother reporting this one, it was so bad, but Conroy’s own release at least provided enough material to give this pathetic little spat the lustre of the Senator’s classic ministerial contempt in action.
Actually, why not start a system of rating NBN press releases? Mr Turnbull, I give yours only 3/10. At least enough research was done to ascertain that NBN funds were being shifted around in the budget. But by dreaming up a direct causal link with NBN Co’s rollout schedule without any evidence, you lose seven points. On the contrary, I give Conroy’s press release 6/10. Unlike Turnbull’s, Conroy’s media release was mainly based in fact, but the Minister loses points for even bothering to respond to Turnbull’s unprovable claims to start with; and its insults aren’t contemptuous enough for a Senator of Conroy’s debating stature to really entertain me. Both sides can do better.
Here’s just one example demonstrating that regardless of Mr Turnbull’s volume of research, what eventuates, what goes into LNP policy and what he says very much distorts the facts to be slanted to favour his argument. And when there are no facts to reference that even obtusely resemble supporting evidence he will simply fabricate statistics and events to suit his extremely biassed interests.
Make no mistake, the appearance of reasonable statements from a man like Turnbull simply means you don’t have the whole story. Quite apart from the technical and budgetary arguments against the LNP NBN plan, the ongoing and repetitive demonstrations of incompetence and dishonesty from Abbot, Turnbull and Hockey are an indictment against their suitability as the Government of Australia.
If they can mislead the Australian public and get away with it, what gives?
Because there are no repercussions for political lies or dishonesty. We supposedly exercise that power when we vote…
If a doctor lied to me this much I’d want him locked away for a goodly period.
Turnbull gets to smile, shake hands and tell me how much research he has done… heaven help me.
I don’t even want them penalized that much, just something trivial like $1 to charity for every sentence they deliver that’s proven to be utter bs. The money won’t stop Turnbull, but the tallied shame might?
+1 Really well put TrevorX!
In the last 2 years I’ve come to realize that when the three Amigos (Abbott, Turnbull & Hockey) say something they usually mean the opposite. Which is exactly why I won’t be voting LNP until these dills are knocked off there perch’s.
Same here, I used to vote Liberal all the way up to John Howards first term, then I relaised they aren’t the same party they used to be…
Id love to see more of this ‘Rating NBN press releases’. You could be on a winner of an idea there Renai
Yeah, I think it’s a great idea. However, why not take it to the next stage and start up a website that holds politicians accountable to their promises. Such a page once existed a while ago and it was called “Promise Watch” and it was hosted by GetUp. However, it strangely disappeared into the ether.
Politicians currently rely on the typical voter forgetting or being uninformed. I think that is a huge problem.
I think having a site like this would be a great idea.
A site to really look at what the politicians are promising us and getting the information about the topics relating to such promises/claims to the people would be a great idea.
People need the facts and information to make a proper informed decision about how they feel about certain issues.
there is a just recently set up web site based on a US version http://www.politifact.com.au/truth-o-meter/statements/
More attempts at trying to con Australians from mister Copper …. mister Fraudband seems rather more appropriate!
All lib voters cannot believe this is going down in the history books for their childrens chidren to read all about!
While I prefer Conroys NBN plan, on the point of credibility I will take Turnbulls word over Conroys any day.
While I’m no major fan of Conroy personally (his arrogant stance over the Internet filter pretty much ruined that for me) to say you would take MT’s word over anyone’s really defies comprehension. But then, I suppose it comes down to what you know, too – I’ve been following his deceit and dishonesty for several years now and the only thing you can trust him to do is act in his own self interest, regardless of the lies required or the cost to others.
Conroy layering NBN Co. as an avenue for his own departure pretty much secured my distaste for his business ethics personally. Turnbull might not be a lot better but when comparing the two, Turnbull wins out easily.
Conroys claim in February that the primary opposition to the internet filter was a slow down of transfer speeds which will become moot when the NBN is rolled out pretty much says to me that he will revisit the idea if reelected.
Like I said, I would prefer Conroys NBN plan but I certianly wont shed a tear when he is thrown into opposition in September.
“on the point of credibility I will take Turnbulls word over Conroys any day.”
Can you explain why? I really would like to hear what you think makes Malcolm credible, considering some of the porkies he’s been spinning over the last few years, in fact the entire party seems to have come down with a bad case of the “that was a non-core promise” flu recently.
I will just copy and paste my response above. Read my comment very carefully and you will understand I am comparing Turnbull and Conroy only. You seem to have misinterpreted that I am comparing governments.
Conroy layering NBN Co. as an avenue for his own departure pretty much secured my distaste for his business ethics personally. Turnbull might not be a lot better but when comparing the two, Turnbull wins out easily.
Conroys claim in February that the primary opposition to the internet filter was a slow down of transfer speeds which will become moot when the NBN is rolled out pretty much says to me that he will revisit the idea if reelected.
Like I said, I would prefer Conroys NBN plan but I certianly wont shed a tear when he is thrown into opposition in September.
“Conroy layering NBN Co. as an avenue for his own departure pretty much secured my distaste for his business ethics personally”
I see you have said that twice. What do you mean?
Care to explain what “Conroy layering NBN Co. as an avenue for his own departure” actually means?
I’m no fan of an Internet filter either, but Malcolms policy for an “e-safety commissioner to take down undesirable content from the Internet” doesn’t actually sound any better to me, especially if that commissioner is a political appointment.
They are both as bad as each other in this regard.
Renai
“and its insults aren’t contemptuous enough for a Senator of Conroy’s debating stature to really entertain me. Both sides can do better.”
+100
A bit of Keating would not go astray
As a matter of interest the rants are flowing freely on M.T’s site
Let’s see if this ends up on politifact.
According to the Corporate Plan Exhibit 9-2 NBN Co was expecting 7.5B Total Gov Funding by end FY2013, 13.6B by FY2014, 20.3 by FY2015, 25.0B by FY2016 and 28.9B by FY2017.
According to the budget papers NBN Co will now have 5.4B (-2.1B) by FY2013, 10.5B (-3.1B) by FY2014, 16.8B (-3.5B) by FY2015, 22.1B (-2.9B) by FY2016 and 26.8B (-2.1B) by 2017.
Turnbull’s point seems to be that if NBN Co has less funds on a certain date than required in the Corporate Plan then they can’t build as much as predicted in the Corporate plan by that date, which doesn’t seem to be a contraversial claim.
It seems to me that Conroy’s response is verballing Turnbull by claiming that he is saying premises will miss out on the NBN completely whereas Turnbull is clearly saying that premises won’t have the NBN by the date promised in the Corporate plan.
If the funding requirements in the Corporate Plan have nothing to do with the ability to reach the yearly rollout targets then something is extremely wrong with the plan.
Turnbull is overstating the number of premises that will be delayed by ignoring that a bunch of the funding isn’t spent directly on the rollout but I can’t see how NBN Co can deliver the planned number of connections in a given year with significantly less funding provided in that year given that NBN Co told the Joint Committee on the NBN that they weren’t expecting a signifcant saving compared to the Corporate plan estimates.
Actually, there is another possibility.
The NBN could just be reducing it’s cash balance and working it’s credit terms harder, reducing the amount of cash held. There was $778m cash at bank at 30 June 2012 after all, which dropped to $689m by 31 December 2012.
In fact on page 20 of his background briefing PDF, MT states:
“Labor appears to be allowing NBN Co to build up huge cash reserves. The revised plan combined
with the equity investment scheduled in the 2012‐13 Budget leaves NBN Co with over $2 billion
cash on hand as at June 2013.”
The difference between the plan cash balance and what the NBN co seems to be asking for represents over $1.5b, accounting for most of the difference in those figures. Costs relating to 84k premises (~$200m) passed in June being still payable at 30 June, would probably reduce the equity variance to an immaterial level.
So the government, by actually using sensible cash flow management, to avoid a problem MT identified less than a month ago, is in MT’s eyes, a roll out failure rather than being a sensible business decision.
Lachlan, I agree that in the short term it is the correct response but the reduced funding persists beyond when the current rollout delay is meant to be recovered and is larger than the predicted excess funds in the Corporate plan.
In FY2016 the Corporate Plan expected $1.5B cash in hand at the previous funding levels and funding has been decreased by $2.9B leaving them $1.4B short of the expenditure in the Corporate plan. It is less than the $3.5B identified by Turnbull but $1.4B is still a significant gap that would have to be made up by increased private debt, delayed spending or drastically increased revenue (total revenue to 2016 is expected to be $2B so they would need to exceed this by 70% to cover the shortfall from revenue).
While average AVC revenue per FTTH user was 6% better at the end of March than predicted in the Corporate Plan this is completely overwhelmed by the reduction in users due to the rollout delays so i don’t see increased revenue as plausibly covering the $1.4B gap by 2016.
So that seems to leave increased private debt, at higher cost to NBN Co, or delayed spending.
@ Tallweirdo
“If the funding requirements in the Corporate Plan have nothing to do with the ability to reach the yearly rollout targets then something is extremely wrong with the plan.
It could also be that receipts are greater than anticipated which is allowing NBN co to reduce the upfront need for credit input from Government in the short term?
There is also the stated $3.6 billion contingency that is listed within the corporate plan too, that should not be budgeted as being needed to be paid, as that would have forward interest expenses to be considered also, so there is more that needs to be considered than just the numbers from the budget papers alone.
As noted above in my response to Lachlan, revenue is likely to be below target due to the rollout delays so that isn’t a likely source of additional funds. Additionally if they were getting that much extra revenue the total Government funding requirement could drop by about $10B which hasn’t happened so there doesn’t seem to be vastly increased revenue.
Regarding the contingency, you have to budget to spend the contingency otherwise you don’t have a contingency you just go overbudget instead. The contingency can be reduced over time as you become more certain of your costs but NBN Co don’t seem to have a high level of confidence at the moment.
NBN Co told the Joint Committee they expect the average cost to pass a premises with FTTH to be $1,100 to $1,400, with the Corporate plan estimate being $1,200. As they are passing 12M premises a $1,100 cost would be a $1.2B saving whereas a $1,400 cost would be a $2.4B overspend and would take 2/3 of the current contingency.
Until they have a better idea which end of their estimate the cost is likely to end up at it would be premature to significantly reduce the contingency.
@Tallweirdo
I think it’s far too early to be assuming anything one way or another.
The premise of Turnbull’s argument was to use the shock terms such as “delay” and “miss out” to try and make it appear as though the NBN would not get to those it promised. While the numbers certainly show NBNCo. will not be providing as many connections as fast as they say they would, it does NOT show any FURTHER delay simply through the expenditure outlaid in forward estimates. This is the misleading part of Turnbull’s argument.
If Turnbull had said “NBNCo. clearly expect an ongoing delay and cost blowout because the forward estimates do not show a catch up of funding” it might have been more legitimate, although as I said before, it’s too early to say such, as we don’t know what possibilities private debt funding will bring to total funding. And in fact, seeing as the Senate Committee are recommending to NBNCo. to seek private funding ASAP, as compared to their not before 2015 target, that could be part of what the forward estimates are projecting. But as I said, too early.
Murdoch’s Newspeak Corporation (it’s primary revenue source is cash for comment) Alan Jones and Andrew Bolt are the Coalition voters primary information source, says a lot for the country when those guys and other loopy right wing nutters like Piers Ackerman, Miranda Devine and Janet Albrechtsen are guiding Australia’s future.
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/breakup-could-breathe-new-life-into-news-20130517-2js2l.html
Yeah, hopefully someone a bit more centrist buys them….it’d make The Australian the great paper it once was…
tinman
Actually, not being sold, just splitting the Company with Rupert as bossman for Australia – all depending on firewalls and the huge profits from Foxtel and Sky Sport and will be focussing on lifting those video revenues – reading between the lines ensuring no cometitors can get established and outbid for the Sporting Contracts. That is TA and MT’s job
Read the article
Taking points off Conroy for responding seems a bit unfair. If he doesn’t respond then the coalition and its supporters will cry loudly that Turnballs claims never being rejected or refuted is evidence of their factualness.
My scores would be 3/10 for Turnball and 8/10 for Conroy, bonus points being given to Conroy for not just replying by asking Malcom what he’d been smoking?
I agree here. Turnbull’s claim’s could not be left unchallenged.
Blame the media types who report Turnbull’s claims without any analysis, rather than Conroy for setting the record straight.
“Blame the media types who report Turnbull’s claims without any analysis”
Indeed, the Murdoch press will actually polish it up a bit for him.
In fact, I have seen this exact comment from Turnbull in the past “Show me one place where he has disputed my numbers”. (I think in direct response to a $90billion dollar claim question)
Even if Turnbull’s bizarre conclusion was accurate, how exactly would it confirm that “the Labor NBN is unaffordable”? That makes less than no sense.
I’m sure Joe Hockey thinks it’s a well thought out and reasoned response.
Well it depends how you view this weeks Labor Budget figures of a $19 billion deficit and Government debt peaking at $356 billion.
$356B? Mostly false.
http://www.politifact.com.au/truth-o-meter/statements/2013/may/15/joe-hockey/does-budget-say-labor-will-breach-300-billion-debt/
Sorry I read a figure from an external (to the Government) prediction, make that $256 billion by 2014 and $260 billion from the Budget papers of this week.
The point I was making doesn’t change.
*$260 billion by 2015.
What exactly does that have to do with Turnbull’s assertion that spending less on something proves it’s too expensive?
You “fact” wasn’t actually a fact (though I do commend you on correcting yourself ;o)), but even corrected it means very little.
US debt is a 75% of GDP, at our peak, we’ll only be at 20% of GDP. Back around Federation, it was fairly common for us to run 1:1 debt/GDP with a peak of 120% of GDP (thanks to all that nation building).
Australia has plenty of room to move in this regard (though it is good that Swan has tightened the belt a little by correcting a few things like the baby bonus).
I’m not so sure our economy will be able to cope with the Liberals “slash and burn” (although they now swear off anything termed “austerity”) approach (income tax cuts and tax increases on companies like retailing? With a high dollar and the mining boom winding down? Massive cuts in government spending when the economy will actually need it?). We’re in for a rough ride come Sept 14…
Your writing style seems familiar, but the tag seems fairly recent, have you changed names here recently?
Renai, I think you are being a bit generous with your 6/10 rating for Conroy, let’s look at a two of his statements a bit closer.
“The Budget reconfirms the total government equity contributions to NBN Co will be up to $30.4 billion,” Conroy added. “This compares with the $29.5 billion that Malcolm Turnbull intends to borrow to build an inadequate network that will be obsolete by the time it is built.”
Let’s compare eggs with eggs here not Govrenment equity vs borrowings, if we are comparing ‘borrowings’ or required funding the borrowings figure for the NBN is $44.1b, it was raised in the last 2012 Corporate plan.
“The only way Australians will miss out on the NBN is if the Coalition wins the next election and disconnects 9 million households from getting fibre to the home for free.,” said Conroy.”
Nice emotive use of the word ‘disconnec’t here, it insinuates that 9 million households will be disconnected from FTTH under Coalition policy.
“Let’s compare eggs with eggs here not Govrenment equity vs borrowings, if we are comparing ‘borrowings’ or required funding the borrowings figure for the NBN is $44.1b, it was raised in the last 2012 Corporate plan.”
That $44.1 is from all sources, not just the Government.
“Nice emotive use of the word ‘disconnec’t here, it insinuates that 9 million households will be disconnected from FTTH under Coalition policy.”
One of the definitions of “disconnected” is “Having been divided; having the unity destroyed”. Seems pretty right to me.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess you haven’t read the Coalition plan yet, if little points like these with the Labor one upsets you so much, the Liberal one will probably give you an aneurism with all it’s murky pitfalls and gotchas.
@tinman_au
“That $44.1 is from all sources, not just the Government.”
I don’t know what you mean by this but it is quite simple, if you want to compare figures make sure you compare like with like, Coalition projected borrowings for their NBN is $29.5b, Labor projected borrowings for their NBN is $44.1b.
‘One of the definitions of “disconnected” is “Having been divided; having the unity destroyed”. Seems pretty right to me.’
So it just pure coincidence that the ambiguous word ‘disconnect’ which has a direct technical meaning related to a residence fixed line was used instead of more clear phrasing such as ‘ will be connected to Coalition FTTN not Labor FTTH’ for example?
I ring up Telstra or my ISP and request my PSTN line be disconnected as I am going all wireless, it doesn’t mean I am having ‘the unity destroyed’. :)
The back room political directive must be to keep mentioning the word ‘free’ when referring to the Labor FTTH rollout, of course it’s not free, it comes out of Government debt that must be repaid and draws down on Government equity that contributes to that Government deficit, but that’s boring economic stuff the average punter doesn’t want to know about.
Additionally I have no idea where the ‘9 million households’ figure comes from, because not even the Coalition have a clue how many households will be connected to FTTN (assuming that’s what Conroy means) until after the post election reviews are done, perhaps someone can provide that statistical source as it is quite specific?
‘the Liberal one will probably give you an aneurism with all it’s murky pitfalls and gotchas.’
The Coalition plan is a masterpiece of maybe’s, vagueness, and exit signs with 99.99% of it dependent on post election appraisals, reviews and negotiations, but I’m not overly concerned, the first Labor NBN Co Corporate plan came out four months after the 2010 election, amended substantially again in 2012 with a new plan and rollout figures amended again from the 2012 plan in April/May this year.
The purpose of the Coalition Plan was to make it different from the Labor plan and to concentrate on the two Achilles heels of the Labor Plan, cost and speed of rollout, and keep picking away at those two right up to election day.
“I don’t know what you mean by this but it is quite simple, if you want to compare figures make sure you compare like with like, Coalition projected borrowings for their NBN is $29.5b, Labor projected borrowings for their NBN is $44.1b.”
Not all money for the real NBN is borrowed from the government, some will be borrowed from the private sector. Turnbull hasn’t mentioned this happening with his LBN, which doesn’t surprise me, who’d want to invest in end-of-life technology? Other than the Liberal party I mean.
“So it just pure coincidence that the ambiguous word ‘disconnect’ which has a direct technical meaning related to a residence fixed line was used instead of more clear phrasing such as ‘ will be connected to Coalition FTTN not Labor FTTH’ for example?”
Something being emotive doesn’t mean it’s not accurate. I’m pretty sure people know if they aren’t on the NBN yet, so Conroy can’t possibly mean that Turnbull is going to come to their house and pull the fibre out of the wall. You underestimate peoples’ intelligence.
“The back room political directive must be to keep mentioning the word ‘free’ when referring to the Labor FTTH rollout, of course it’s not free”
But it is free to the end user to get connected. Given the Liberal party has lied in the past and said it’s not, can you blame them? And now it’s an easy way to differentiate; Labor free, Coalition up to $5000.
“Additionally I have no idea where the ’9 million households’ figure comes from, because not even the Coalition have a clue how many households will be connected to FTTN (assuming that’s what Conroy means) until after the post election reviews are done, perhaps someone can provide that statistical source as it is quite specific?”
The Coalition said 70% of premises will be on FttN. I’m not sure how many premises there are so I don’t know if that 9 million is correct. BTW it’s not quite specific, 9 million is a very round number, it has six zeroes in it!
‘the Liberal one will probably give you an aneurism with all it’s murky pitfalls and gotchas.’
“amended substantially again in 2012”
Nope. The 2012 plan was almost identical to the 2010 one.
“The purpose of the Coalition Plan was to make it different from the Labor plan and to concentrate on the two Achilles heels of the Labor Plan, cost and speed of rollout, and keep picking away at those two right up to election day.”
Trouble is the Coalition plan is not cheaper and the assertion that it’s faster to rollout is based on the idea that it takes less than 6 months to plan, test, negotiate with Telstra and get the deals approved by the ACCC; something which took over 2 years on the current NBN which is a less complex network design.
@Fibroid
Point of correction:
Comparing the NBN’s $44.1 billion total funding and the Coalition’s total funding of $29.5 billion is disingenuous to the NBN. The NBN requires only $30.4 billion from the government. No one is saying it isn’t more expensive overall. It is. But the $13.7 billion from private enterprise is not against the government and is NBNCo’s problem to deal with NOT the governments. Turnbull’s arguments surrounding the cost of the NBN pivot almost wholly on the idea that his FTTN network will cost less TO THE GOVERNMENT. But it won’t. Not in any substantial way (assuming both estimates are correct of course).
TLDR: Comparing total funding of the 2 plans is disingenuous because of the DIFFERENCES in funding model between the 2.
Karl and Seven have addressed your other points as well as I could have (probably even better!), so I’ll leave those with them, but I’d like to address this comment in particular:
“The Coalition plan is a masterpiece of maybe’s, vagueness, and exit signs with 99.99% of it dependent on post election appraisals, reviews and negotiations, but I’m not overly concerned, the first Labor NBN Co Corporate plan came out four months after the 2010 election, amended substantially again in 2012 with a new plan and rollout figures amended again from the 2012 plan in April/May this year.”
The big difference between the two plans is that the Labor one wasn’t being put forward as a replacement for a previous, on going, national system (you might try to argue that Telstra was that on going national system, but most people won’t then take you seriously).
The LBN is a plan to replace an on going national system, and needs to show HOW it is better, not just with a “Trust us, we know experts”, but with actual facts, figures and reasoning on how to avoid issues like “The Telstra Problem”. If Malcolm is so confident Telstra will “be there” for him, lets see him get an undertaking from Telstra that they’ll work out a deal for the copper, but stick with the current payment of $11B.
The current NBN has an issue with the roll-out speed, but they are addressing that by employing their own crew in the field for NT allowing Syntheo to concentrate on WA and SA. As the tired old saying goes, you don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater…you keep the good and correct the bad…
Yeah Conroy is correct on this count he has mentioned it multiple times and Malcolm has never complained including in their debate the other day and with how Malcolm likes to bitch about anything we would have known all about it by now yet the silence is deafening.
Certainly can’t accuse NBNCo over going over budget.
Any more outragous figures from any party should be called what they are. Lies, fabrications, untruths. The people who spout them of course, should be called what they are. Dirty little liars.
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