Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I congratulate and thank the member for Franklin for her very thoughtful contribution to this issue and her resolu-tion. One thing I hate is exploitation. The thing that comes just after that is opportunistic behaviour. This is a typi-cal example of both. The old PMG and Telecom were known for their commitment to service. In recent years we looked to the changes in Telstra—and I will not bore you to tears by telling you about the last administration of Telstra but I thought it was appalling—and I had great expectations, as did my colleague from Tasmania, that with this change of administration we would see a commitment to customer friendly service and all those sorts of things. But what did we see? We saw a raid on our back pockets.

The payment in cash in return for a service is the most fundamental form of payment there is. You can go back to pre-Biblical times and that was the way. You handed over your shekels for the service that was delivered or for the goods you were buying. But no, not with Telstra. No, no; they are different. They can charge you $2.20 for paying your bill in cash—

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