Sharryn Jackson (Hasluck, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today in support of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Communications Fund) Bill 2008. We are in the midst of an exciting and ever-changing global telecommunications environment. When federal Labor announced its broadband policy last March, it indicated then that it would use the funds in the Communications Fund to partly finance its commitment to establish a national broadband network. This bill represents an early step in the process to deliver on this significant election commitment, a commitment that will see an investment on a promise to deliver a world-class national broadband network, with minimum speeds of 12 megabits per second to 98 per cent of Australian homes and businesses, to be rolled out over the next five years.

This bill amends part 9C of the Telecommunications (Consumer Protection and Service Standards) Act 1999 to enable money in the Communications Fund to be used for the purposes of funding a national broadband network. The use of the fund will be entirely consistent with the purpose for which it was intended: to improve telecommunications in rural and regional Australia. The Rudd Labor government is determined to bring Australia out of the technological black hole we were left to wallow in for 11½ long years by the Howard-Costello government. In his speech to the House on 12 March, the member for Dunkley claimed that this bill was:

... the first effort to unravel all of that sound public policy ... the future proofing protection ... that remote ... and regional Australia had looked for to give them comfort ...

He referred to the Rudd government’s decision to invest in a national broadband network and access the fund as a ‘state-sanctioned smash and grab raid’. He called the National Broadband Network commitment a ‘vague’ and ‘citycentric idea’ and a ‘sound bite’ which ‘the Rudd government is struggling to turn into public policy’. It is remarkable that the member for Dunkley would say that when for 11½ years the Howard-Costello government was aware of major problems in accessing broadband around Australia, in particular in regional and remote parts of Australia, much of which is in my own state of Western Australia. In that time it virtually sat on its hands and did nothing or little while the caravan moved on. The previous government did not build a national broadband network. Furthermore, it only promised to create one in 2007 after it realised how popular with voters Labor’s plan was.

The previous government legislated to quarantine the $2 billion Communications Fund so that only interest earned could be used and to only allow expenditure of the revenue stream. Under this approach, approximately $400 million would have been available to improve telecommunications in regional, rural and remote Australia every three years. The member for Dunkley said that the Communications Fund was put in place to protect rural and regional Australians against the emergence of a new digital divide as technology moves forward. Frankly, by opposing this bill the opposition appear to want to ensure that a digital divide continues. Without the Rudd government’s proposal, homes and businesses would have been left out in the cold without the best fibre technology available to them.

The Howard-Costello government were not nation builders. They were tired and out of touch. They completely failed to recognise that a reliable, high-speed broadband network is, to our nation in this century, the modern equivalent of the railway network in the late 19th century. They failed to comprehend how critical a modern telecommunications infrastructure is for productivity growth and to our economy. They failed to understand that a national broadband network is a critical tool for small businesses for effective e-health and education services. We saw something like 17 so-called broadband proposals during the life of the Howard-Costello government which seemed to go nowhere. It took the previous government 11 years to announce a task force, a task force that was widely criticised as not having the requisite skills to ensure the best outcome for Australians, with guidelines that provided almost no clarity on the objectives of that task force and their process.

It was only when they found themselves staring down the barrel of the 2007 federal election that the previous government finally announced a belated broadband plan. They came up with a simple two-tiered, two-class plan they called ‘Australia Connected’, which was condemned by some people in regional and rural Australia as a second-class service delivered by an outdated system. The tired Howard-Costello government failed the Australian people by promising a substandard broadband plan that would have done little to improve current levels of telecommunications infrastructure in Australia, particularly in my electorate of Hasluck. This was not a long-term vision that would have served the people of this country. This was just another illusion.

There can be no denying that, as a consequence of the previous government floundering on the National Broadband Network, Australia is behind in the digital dark ages. Time and again the Howard-Costello government demonstrated that they were not nation builders. Instead, we witnessed bandaid, quick-fix solutions that the now opposition hoped would help them scrape through to the next election, and during that time Australia went backwards compared with the rest of the world in broadband and broadband infrastructure. Our future productivity relies upon a national broadband network that will open new markets for Australian business and drive economic productivity and growth in the future. The Australian people deserve a world-class, fibre-to-the-node broadband future that will guide Australia’s economy, and the Rudd Labor government is proud that we have a plan that will contribute to the wellbeing and long-term economic prosperity of Australians everywhere.

I hosted a forum in my electorate of Hasluck last year with the now Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator the Hon. Stephen Conroy, to discuss telecommunications with community members. We were both struck by the level of frustration felt by constituents about the lack of adequate, reliable telecommunications and broadband services in their suburbs. These complaints were often from people who lived only a few kilometres from the nearest exchange. My office regularly receives complaints from constituents who are tired and fed up with being passed around and are trying to find out why they and other residents in their streets and suburbs are still unable to obtain broadband access. People who live no more than 10 or 20 minutes from the Perth CBD have no access to broadband, despite several applications to their ISPs, because the infrastructure is not available to them. I find it appalling that even today a web designer who lives in Huntingdale and runs his business from home has to make do with the old dial-up system. These are hard-working residents and constituents who depend upon broadband access to provide for their families while trying to sustain their own businesses and livelihoods, yet they have been told again and again that they do not live in areas which can be accessed by broadband. These are just some of the people the previous government failed.

Under the Rudd government’s National Broadband Network, the hard-working families and business owners in my electorate, from Maddington to Helena Valley, will finally have access to the digital services they deserve. The government has committed an investment of up to $4.7 billion to establish a new high-speed broadband network, in partnership with the private sector, to 98 per cent of Australian homes and businesses over the next five years. As I have said, this is critical to our long-term social and economic prosperity. The bill also ensures that Australians in rural and regional areas are not forgotten. Indeed, the need for investment in telecommunications services is greater in rural and regional Australia than it is in our major capital cities. I know this as someone who grew up in the bush and who understands the importance of services to people who live and work in our rural and regional areas. Increasingly now we are seeing advances in technology, allowing people access to more sophisticated diagnostic services in health and to better and more reliable education services—all dependent on decent access to broadband or a high-speed broadband network, something that for over a decade, as I have said, the Howard government failed to properly invest in.

I am also pleased that the Regional Telecommunications Independent Review Committee, chaired by Dr Bill Glasson, announced in February that it intends to run a national program of public meetings in regional Australia to address the adequacy of telecommunications in rural and remote parts of the country and that these public hearings will commence in Western Australia. Given the potential importance of the committee’s findings, I welcome the government’s decision to extend the report of the Regional and Telecommunications Independent Review Committee to August 2008. This will allow the committee to consider the National Broadband Network and other government policies which will benefit regional telecommunications across Australia in making their recommendations.

The bill amends the existing act to allow funds to be drawn from the $2 billion principal in the Communications Fund rather than the revenue stream of $400 million that would have been made available every three years to spend on improving telecommunications in rural and regional Australia. By contrast, this government is prepared to invest $4.7 billion to fund this critical piece of national infrastructure now. The government is determined to ensure that Australians in regional and remote areas are able to access reliable high-speed broadband services. It is worth noting that regional Australians would have been waiting 35 years longer to achieve the same level of investment under the previous government’s legislation.

We are currently experiencing an unprecedented technological transformation in almost every aspect of our lives. It is time that we started to meet the challenge of putting Australia on an equal footing with our global competitors after so many years of neglect. As I have said, I think it is extraordinary that members opposite claim to be concerned about access to technological services such as high-speed broadband by those in regional and remote Australia when there is such a stark difference in the preparedness to invest in providing that kind of infrastructure to people who live in our regional and remote areas. It demonstrates that the Rudd Labor government understands that broadband and the digital economy are crucial to Australia’s long-term prosperity and that, unlike its predecessor, this government has a plan which will lead Australia out of the telecommunications dark ages and into the digital future. This bill represents a significant milestone in the implementation of the Rudd government’s initiative to give Australia as a whole a first-class broadband network for the future, a commitment that was extremely popular at the 2007 federal election. I commend this bill to the House.

Debate interrupted.