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

The government's NBN plan is going from strength to strength. As I have previously shared with colleagues in this place, in 2013 when this government inherited the NBN it inherited what was a failed project. Contractors had downed tools in four states. Despite $6½ billion having been spent by our predecessors, only 51,000 Australians were actually paying customers of the NBN. I am very pleased to advise colleagues that the NBN is now available to 3.34 million premises nationwide. Isn't that fantastic? That is 28 per cent of the nation. By the middle of next year that will be 50 per cent of the nation, and it will be all done and dusted by 2020—six to eight years sooner than would have been the case under those opposite.