GLENN STERLE

LABOR SENATOR FOR WESTERN AUSTRALIA

DUTY SENATOR FOR HASLUCK

 

ABBOTT GOVERNMENT’S SECOND RATE NBN – OVER BUDGET AND BEHIND SCHEDULE 

 

 

Duty Senator for Hasluck Glenn Sterle welcomed NBN Co’s announcement today that it will boost investment in training to recruit new workers to build the National Broadband Network.

 

However, this is too little, too late from Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull.

 

Many more Australians would be working on building the NBN today if the Abbott Government kept its promises.

 

The rollout of the NBN is slower than Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull promised and it is more expensive than they promised.

 

In opposition, Mr Abbott and Mr Turnbull promised their second rate network would reach all Australian homes by 2016. They have broken this promise.

 

The Budget papers reveal that only:

 

“3.1 million homes and businesses [are anticipated] to have the NBN in place or under construction by September 2016.”

 

2015-16 Budget, Overview, page 21

 

The Coalition also promised to build the NBN for $29.5 billion. This has now blown out to $42 billion.

 

The Coalition also promised that the full scale rollout of their second rate fibre-to-the-node network would occur by mid-2014:

 

“It is forecast that the large scale rollout of any changes to the network design—such as implementing fibre to the node—would commence in mid 2014.”

 

Coalition Broadband Policy—Frequently Asked Questions, 9 August 2013

 

It is now August 2015 and this still has not happened.

 

In April 2013, there were approximately 4,200 workers in the field building the fibre network.

 

Over two years later, the Coalition is only today announcing that they will hire more workers.