Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator McAllister for her question. Senator McAllister is quite right that the 2016 corporate plan presents a peak funding range of between $46 billion and $56 billion, with a base case of $49 billion, and she is right that the strategic review estimated peak funding of $41 billion. The NBN, as it is rolling out, is learning from experience, as it has also learnt from the many reviews that it has commissioned and it is getting a much better and much more precise fix on the cost of the NBN. That is an important point, because our predecessors had no fix, they had no handle, on the costs of the scheme. This government has had to put in train with the board and management of nbn co processes to determine, to get a realistic handle on, what the true expenses of the NBN are because the NBN was left in such bad order by those opposite. As I have indicated before, in stark contrast to the work and the preparation done for the NDIS, where we had things such as a 2,000-page Productivity Commission report, we had a preparation sum total from Senator Conroy of a coaster with some of his hieroglyphics. I return to something that I posed the other day to this chamber: in what plan would you have more confidence? Would it be one developed by Senator Conroy or one developed by Mr Turnbull?