Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Communications. I remind the minister that 19.6 per cent of households in Corangamite do not have access to the internet at home, and that a key impediment to home internet access is affordability. When will Australians learn more about the impact of the former government's NBN on broadband affordability, and how will this be changed by the current government's plan to deliver the NBN?

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for her question, and I note her passion and strong advocacy for ensuring her community has access to very fast broadband. She is quite right: the biggest barrier to broadband is not technology, it is affordability. Australians on the lowest incomes have the lowest rate of internet usage in their households.

Of course, under Labor's NBN plan—and this is their plan, not ours—average revenue per user was going to treble from 2012 to 2021. So they were going to spend tens of billions of dollars on broadband and make it less affordable for Australians, not more affordable.

But of course the truth is that there was a lot about the NBN that the Labor government knew that it did not share with the Australian people. The former minister, the member for Grayndler, was well aware from the NBN Co. itself that it was not going to hit its targets for June 30 2014. He refused to release the reports and indications that showed it was going to miss that target by 70 per cent. He then—

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker I rise on a point of order. I would ask the minister to table the alleged report he is referring to.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! That is not a point of order. There is no point of order.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The honourable member would be well aware that it was tabled, actually, in the Australian Financial Review, so it is hardly a secret!

But yet, there is more—there is a great deal more. On the weekend we learnt that the Labor government had been advised by its investment banker, Lazard, that the NBN, on the government's plan, was going to result in a $31 billion loss—a negative net present value. And they did not share that with anyone. The NBN has been the characteristically reckless Labor undertaking from the very start—from the moment it was conceived by Senator Conroy and Kevin Rudd on the back of a beer coaster on a VIP flight.

And that beer coaster should be elevated. It should be an exhibit in Labor's pool room of horrors, it really should.

Honourable members interjecting—

No! It should be there with other historic artefacts, such as the fridge at the Lodge on which Prime Minister Gough Whitlam approved the Khemlani loans arrangements, to bypass the loans council. And, of course, the Labor pool room of horrors should not be without the lazy susan from the Hong Ho Vietnamese restaurant where the Leader of the Opposition plotted the downfall of Kevin Rudd!

Jason Clare (Blaxland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Communications. Given the answer that the minister has just given the parliament, will he now release his incoming ministers brief?

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am delighted to get that question from the shadow minister! Now we are on the topic of releasing things, I call on the Leader of the Opposition to release—

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. He is once again indicating that he is about to be not directly relevant. It should not be the situation where we have to—

Honourable members interjecting—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! We will have some order, thank you! I would ask the Manager of Opposition Business which standing order he is referring to and then make his point.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The standing order with respect to direct relevance.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And?

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And the minister is not being directly relevant to the question. And he has even just flagged to the parliament that he does not intend to be.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I call the honourable the Minister for Communications and ask him to be relevant to the question.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker, I will be very directly relevant, but I am concerned that the shadow minister opposite, who recently compared this place to Hogwarts, now obviously believes he has magical powers of being able to foretell the future. The decisions about incoming ministers briefs are taken not by the minister but by the senior public servants that take them, but I would be prepared—very, very happy—to encourage my secretary to release that incoming ministers brief if the Leader of the Opposition were prepared to consent to release all of the cabinet papers relating to the NBN, because Senator Wong—

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker, on a point of order—

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is very relevant.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister will resume his seat. The Manager of Opposition Business? You have had one point of relevancy.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question had—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What is it? Another point of order?

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister is defying your ruling to be directly relevant.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, he is not. There is no point of order. The Minister for Communications.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Transparency is the order of the day and I embrace that wholeheartedly. Senator Wong went on television on Sunday and, reacting to the report about this investment advice—

Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's got nothing to do with the question.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's got nothing to do with your interests, has it? You can't stand the truth, can you? But here it is—

Opposition members interjecting—

Senator Wong said the negative $31 billion figure was 'selective advice'. She did not deny that was given to the government, so we know that was given to the government. The way to put it into context—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister will return—

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

is for all those documents to be released—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Minister!

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

and you can do it.

An opposition member interjecting—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no shame in having some vociferous exchanges.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker, could the minister please table the document he was referring to.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Does the minister have a document which is not confidential?

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker, it gets worse and worse: he thinks he is in Hogwarts! He thinks I had a document under—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister will resume his seat! The Manager of Opposition Business.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If it is of assistance, the minister was referring to his incoming government brief in his answer and it should be tabled.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Minister for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think we don't need a point of order. There was no point of order. We will return to questions.