[LINK] NBN, education and health

[Tom Koltai]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: link-bounces at mailman.anu.edu.au 
> [mailto:link-bounces at mailman.anu.edu.au] On Behalf Of Robin Whittle
> Sent: Tuesday, 5 April 2011 8:49 PM
> To: Link mailing list
> Subject: [LINK] NBN, education and health
> 
><SNIP>
> 
>  Still, I think the 
> money would be better spent directly on health outside the 
> major population centres
> - facilities, salaries, training and professional development 
> and whatever is needed to encourage sufficient numbers or 
> doctors and nurses to live and work outside the big cities.
> 
> If there was better education and healthcare outside the 
> major cities, more people would choose to live there and 
> there would be a stronger demand for broadband communications 
> - which existing providers would be able to meet via DSL, 
> fibre or 3G / WiMax radio links.
> 
> So directly funding health and education would arguably 
> improve broadband in the bush, without the government needing 
> to support any such IT project, or worry about exactly which 
> technologies would be used.  Also, without the need to 
> suddenly create or import a massive workforce of cable layers 
> and the like for a once-off project.
> 
> That said, no matter what governments and corporations do, 
> living far from major population centres will never provide 
> lots of the benefits of living near them.  People make a 
> choice about where to live, and I don't think it is the role 
> of most taxpayers to spend excessive sums of money to bring 
> every benefit to them, no matter where they live.
> 
> Even with the best health and education outcomes for people 
> living outside major cities, the major cities will continue 
> to grow because many things are less expensive (good food, 
> short commute distances to
> jobs) and because a greater variety of activities, jobs etc. 
> are available.  To the extent these attractions exist, we see 
> the price of real-estate in cities going up - until these 
> costs roughly balance out the benefits according to how many 
> people weigh them up.
><SNIP>

Pardon me Robin, whilst I agree with the logic of most of your posting,
the above portion would appear to be a non-sequitur.

In the first para above you want money spent on facilities training to
encourage medical staff to live outside of the cities.

Then you state that people will always elect to live outside the cities
by choice and that the Australian Tax payers shouldn't pay for their
lifestyle choices.

And you would be correct for 37% of the people that live outside cities.
The other 63% are born there because their parents either wanted a drug,
graffiti and gang free environment for them to grow up in or;
 their parents are farmers and keep the people in the cities alive by
growing the wheat, barley, corn, tomatoes, etc etc that the city people
need to survive.
These are the same people that throughout history are hit by droughts,
floods, and treated shockingly by banks.

The effective working life of a solitary farmer [with no labourers]
would be from around age 23 (graduates from agricultural college)
through to around 45-50; at which time he/she would require the kids to
pitch in or to hire labourers.
[This is not intended to start an argument on too old etc., I am merely
stating statistical facts].

Unfortunately because the banks keep making the mistake of repossessing
farmers assets, the 24 year cycle of re-populating our farms needs to
start again.
Or else, the cities starve.

The NBN is bait to keep the farmers kids at home so that they also
become farmers.

What price do you place on lifestyle ?
In the cities we take for granted the ability to stroll down St Kilda
Rd, Darlinghurst Rd, Smith St, Queen St, Queen Victoria Square and pick
and choose our dinner for the evening.
Would that be so simple if the farmers were not growing duck 'la orange,
pate de fois gras or 1977 Grange? I think not.

The NBN offers the offspring of our farmers a lifestyle choice.
 
You claim that existing DSL and wireless services can service the
country areas adequately.

Robin, it's been 15 years and they haven't manage to do so yet.

Many of us in Link know Chris Gilbey [a linker - waves at Chris] he
lives in Berry. By choice. He is not a farmer [Strawberries don't count
Chris].
He lives 2.4 km from a telephone exchange that has ADSL1 ports
available.
Yet he is connected to the internet via Satellite.
There is no copper available to provide him with connectivity.
Thirty kilometres from Chris, across the range is Kangaroo valley. 
Ooops, again, no ADSL.
Wireless?
Forget it.
Telstra, Optus and Vodafone all have towers.
Too many hills. Too much fog. No signal.
At Chris' house, if you want a signal [voda] you have to stand on tiptoe
on the front porch and face Mecca, lift your right leg etc etc...

The Carriers have eschewed the country folk providing the bare minimum
to maximise their revenues - cherry picking the profitable services.

The NBN is to make up for thirty years of infrastructure NOT proceeding
in the country, or not being upgraded.
The NBN is social repatriation for thirty years of "she'll be right...
They wanted to live in the country".

Where I think the money is being wasted is duplicating the
infrastructure that already exists in the cities.
We already have LTE, ADSL-2, Cable etc in the City, why does that need
to be replaced ?

So I guess, I would argue, give the country an infrastructure boost if
only to maintain a level of minimal service in the country areas to
ensure that the lungs and bread basket of the city dwellers can continue
to function without farmers loosing their offspring to the allure of
iPhones in the city.

Conclusion:

43 Billion to keep our farms [and their supporting communities]
gainfully occupied and growing yummy foods - BARGAIN.
43 Billion to replace existing infrastructure in the cities so the
entire country can have an internet filter - Waste of taxpayers money.

Anecdotal observation:
I lived in Darwin without essential infrastructure for a very long time.
(Single lane road - no highway [20% of the road to Adelaide was bulldust
- 1983], microwave towers to Brisbane for all comms, no railway, one TV
station) 
I remember in the mid eighties, we had to wait for weeks on several
occasions to receive canned goods because the Stuart hwy was flooded,
[pre railway].
Newspapers ? Always two days late.
Magazines ? Two weeks late.
Lack of essential service infrastructure slows down development and
results in unnecessary economic hardship. 
Darwin's population was reasonably stagnant for several years.
With the advent of infrastructure investment, Fibre optic cable, the
railway, Tyndall air force base, Darwin's population boomed. [1]

[1] http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/03/31/2203907.htm
/body