Kate Lundy (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I present two ministerial statements on:

(a)

current chemical reviews by the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority; and

(b)

the National Broadband Network.

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for the Murray Darling Basin) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—In relation to the ministerial statement on the National Broadband Network, I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

I thank the Senate for the opportunity and acknowledge the courtesy of Senator Conroy in providing a copy of his statement on the National Broadband Network a short while ago. This is, of course, yet more evidence of why two things should occur. Those two things that should occur are, firstly, that the government should ensure that the NBN is sent off to the Productivity Commission for a full cost-benefit analysis and, secondly, that the NBN business plan should be made public. This ministerial statement demonstrates that there is yet another batch of legislation that this chamber can expect to see next week and that there is extensive expenditure still to be undertaken, yet it provides no real further information to inform the deliberations of this chamber. We have heard all of the hollow claims that are in here before, and yet we see no further real information or evidence.

If we look at the detail of what Senator Lundy has tabled on behalf of Senator Conroy here today, Senator Conroy tells us that the government is embarking on the largest infrastructure project ever undertaken by the Australian government—and yet it is doing it without a cost-benefit study. That is why next week we will be introducing into the Senate for the first time legislation to require the Productivity Commission to undertake the cost-benefit study. That legislation will be brought into this chamber, and I hope it will be dealt with expeditiously.

We look at the detail here and we see that Senator Conroy is continuing to make claims about the number of premises that have taken up a connection of the fibre that is being rolled out past their homes. He claims that rates up around the 90 per cent mark are being accomplished, yet still he provides in this ministerial statement absolutely no evidence or information on how many of the Tasmanian households who have the opportunity to take out actual services under the NBN have chosen to do so. Many of them have the opportunity to do it for free, but all he wants to talk about is how many households who have been offered the connection of fibre to their home at absolutely no cost to them have said, ‘Yes, okay; run the wire to the house.’ That is all. How many of them, however, have taken out a service? Of course, most have not been offered one yet. None of them outside of a small bundle in Tasmania that is still ignored in terms of any detail in this ministerial statement even know what the service might cost them. So they are agreeing to have a cable connected to their home with absolutely no knowledge about the cost, the plan or anything else associated with the NBN program.

What we have here is a case where the government is saying, ‘Show me the money,’ to Australia’s taxpayers. Show us the money so they can invest this $43 billion in their national broadband network. But when the parliament turns around and says to the government, ‘Show us your plans; show us your costings; show us your pricings,’ there is nothing that comes back. This is just a ministerial statement designed to make everyone feel a little bit better. This is a ministerial statement designed to make it look like there is a sense of activity on the government benches—that they are getting on with the job somehow.

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It doesn’t make me feel better.

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for the Murray Darling Basin) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Indeed, Senator Parry is right. It does not make Senator Parry feel better and it certainly does not make me feel any better. It does not make me feel any better, because it is so lacking in detail. It claims that, similar to the implementation study, the NBN business case demonstrates the project’s financial viability. That is all it says about the financial viability. That is all it says about what may or may not be in that business case. That is all the information you get. What about the assumptions? Under what assumptions does this financial viability occur? What is financial viability under this business case? Is it that they will have something that they can sell off to the value of the $43 billion that it is going to cost? In how many years time? What type of return to taxpayers will there be? None of that information is answered by this ministerial statement—none whatsoever.

It strikes me, frankly, that this ministerial statement is little more than an attempt to cover up for the fact that the Prime Minister dropped Senator Conroy in it yesterday. She dropped him in it by saying that the government would release the business plan in December. He had never put a time line on it until then. He was either keeping it up his sleeve to release as part of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer Safeguards) Bill 2010 or he was hoping, as he told Senate estimates not that long ago, to never release the document. We do not know quite what the government’s intentions were. We know they keep changing. We know that Senator Conroy told Senate estimates the business case would not be released. We know, however, that he then said it would probably be released. Then we had the Prime Minister say yesterday that it would be released in December. We come back to the nub of the issue surrounding the business case: the government has it, this document confirms they have it, they say they will release it and the Prime Minister says they will, in fact, release it in December, and yet they will not allow this parliament, this Senate or the Australian people to see this business case before we are asked to vote on the competition and consumer safeguards legislation that mentions and involves the National Broadband Network 62-plus times—before we have to make our decisions or deliberate.

That is just not acceptable and five pages of nice words, five pages of attempts at reassurance that Senator Conroy has provided the chamber with today, will do nothing to convince us of the merits of this case unless we can see the details—the planning, the pricing, the costing and what underlies the so-called viability that they claim. Just claiming there is viability is no good to the Australian Senate or the Australian people. The government need to prove it. Claiming they have done the work is of no benefit because we have heard that before. We heard that about school halls, we heard that about Green Loans, and we heard that about pink batts and home insulation. We have heard before that they have done the work and that projects are viable. This time around we want to see the business case and we believe that, if there is $43 billion on the line, we should be seeing a decent, thorough cost-benefit analysis. There is nothing in this ministerial statement to change our minds.

Question agreed to.