Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to report to the House the disappointment in the electorate of Lalor with the NBN announcement last week. There was a lot of anticipation about the new rollout plan to be announced in my electorate. Many small businesses, many medium sized businesses and thousands and thousands of residents were hoping that, with this announcement, their homes and their businesses would have access to the first-rate NBN that we had been promised. But unfortunately that is not the case for the electorate of Lalor. In fact, there will be no fibre to the node before 2017 in the city of Wyndham at all. The only rollout in 2016 will be hybrid fibre coaxial. There will be no fibre to the node across Lalor until 2017. If you live in Point Cook, Wyndham Vale or Seabrook, you will be waiting until 2018 to get off your ADSL—if you have ADSL, that is—or to get from wireless onto something that is reliable and of a speed that will allow you to conduct your business, to complete your homework, to upload, to download. This is an incredible disappointment for the people of Lalor. They thought that the ex-Minister for Communications would make sure this was delivered. What we have got is an election promise, not a delivery date. What we have got is more expensive and a second-rate NBN.